A nightmarish start to Sunday’s Qatar Grand Prix saw Lewis Hamilton ruled out of the race after a crash with Mercedes team-mate George Russell at the first corner left him down a tyre
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Lewis Hamilton made a nightmarish start to Sunday’s Qatar Grand Prix and was ruled out of the race after a crash with Mercedes team-mate George Russell at the first turn.
Hopes were high for the Silver Arrows due after Russell and Hamilton started second and third on the grid, respectively. However, Hamilton’s ill-advised attempt to overtake his driving partner ended in disaster.
The two shared very different accounts of the incident over the team radio, with Russell heard blaring ‘what the hell’ at his team-mate’s attempted manoeuvre. It was during the safety car shortly afterwards that the 25-year-old said he was ‘lost for words’ and ‘couldn’t do anything’ having watched the crash back on a monitor.
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Hamilton, meanwhile, told his team he’d been ‘taken out by his own team-mate’ as he saw himself as the victim. In what should have been a major opportunity for Mercedes following Carlos Sainz’s withdrawal shortly before Sunday’s race, the clash in Qatar quickly turned calamitous.
Red Bull rival Max Verstappen already sealed his third consecutive world championship on Saturday after team-mate Sergio Perez crashed out of the Sprint race. But Hamilton’s hair-raising departure will be an unexpected bonus for the Dutchman in his bid to build his points pile further.