Video: Controversy as Lewis Hamilton hits Kimi Raikkonen in pit lane
The Canadian Grand Prix took an astonishing twist as Lewis Hamilton eliminated himself and championship rival Kimi Raikkonen in a pit lane crash.
Hamilton had been leading the race but as the field pitted at once during the safety car Raikkonen and Robert Kubica left their pit boxes before Hamilton.
But the three had to stop for a red light at the end of the pits and Hamilton, apparently not having seen it, hit Raikkonen’s Ferrari. Nico Rosberg then ran into the rear of Hamilton. Raikkonen and Hamilton were eliminated while Rosberg pitted for a new front wing and continued.
Hamilton appeared to have turned to avoid Kubica’s car and hit Raikkonen’s instead. It probably was been that he was trying to avoid the pair of them.
But the less charitable will suggest that, faced with the inevitability of hitting either car, he preferred to take out the driver who was his more likely championship rival.
Afterwards Hamilton said he’d seen the red light but didn’t manage to stop his car in time.
The stewards are going to investigate the collision after the race.
Comments have been split across multiple pages. If you’re having trouble viewing the pages click here to see all comments.
Raikkonen was able to drive off and park after the crash, why not get around the track once and try and at least get some points? Surely that would be better than nothing?
If he pass the line until red light,he has been disqualified!understand?
Did he drive off or just roll to the side?
Dr H&S: Look at the rear wing, obviously not fixable. Quite plain to see he moved to try and clear the area.
His rear suspension looked in quite bad shape I think. Besides, rear wings aren’t easily replaceable like front wings…
He drove off but he had no rear wing. I’m guessing it would have taken too long to repair.
Blimey, clearly my page didn’t refresh quick enough. Ignore my comments.
‘The less charitable’ might suggest that Hamilton chose to reflex situation, andhit Raikonnen rather than Kubica? Rather the chronically unknowlegable - there was absolutely no time at all for Hamilton to even register which car was which before he had locked his brakes and slithered into the back of the Ferrari. I’m surprised that you even gave voice to such an idea Keith!
Argh - cut and paste garbage in last post - try again:
‘The less charitable’ might suggest that Hamilton chose to hit Raikonnen rather than Kubica? Rather the chronically unknowlegable - there was absolutely no time at all for Hamilton to even register which car was which before he had locked his brakes and slithered into the back of the Ferrari. I’m surprised that you even gave voice to such an idea Keith!
Sorry.
Kinda new to F1, why on earth is that red light there to begin with? If the pits are open, why cant you leave them? It obviously causes problems. Does anybody know the spirit of the rule?
Hamilton…must have been a little excited since he was behind Rob & Kimi and tried to get a slipstream out of the pits. Great job BUDDY!
Steve,
Letting cars onto the track when the safety car is coming around with a big train would cause a huge amount of confusion…
The cars were coming round the track. Isn’t it to stop them feeding out into the way?
I think Lewis had no idea who he was hitting. I think he yanked the wheel to try and avoid both cars not to purposely hit Kimi.
From the picture below it appears that there was enough room to the left of RAI that Hamilton was going for.
http://www.formula1.com/photos/347×231/tvimages/2008/canada/sunpic11.jpg
I definitely think it was just a plain old garden variety mistake and Hamilton did not intentionally hit Raikkonen rather than Kubica.
What penalty will hamilton get?
Will rosberg also be penalised? Still red when he broke his front wing by hitting hamilton?
Hamilton was aiming for the space beside Kimi while braking, after he realised that the cars in front of him had stopped. Its likely those lights where green when they pitted and changed to red while they were about to leave the pits. But I still believe the team should be updatating the drivers on the tract status especially in such changeable conditions, I mean in terms of traffic lights and a busy pit lane.
Well!
I really think Hamilton shoudl shot his mouth and think a little! Lately he started acting as a F1 superhero or something like that. His mistake today clearly shows that he has a lot to learn to earn a champion’s title! i dont see any appropriate explanation for him not seeing the red light! How come the others did? Besides what the hell was he watching???
This’ll be interesting regarding a penalty. As was stated in Monaco, if a rookie had made that error, they would have gotten a penatly. Although the incoident wouldn’t have warranted it (to me, anyway), I could have seen that being the case.
I’m guessing Hamilton will get away with no penalty, though, as ever, the hypothetics of if a more inexperienced driver had made the mistake had got a penalty will remain.
Add: By the Moncao incident, I’m making reference to Kimi on Sutil
Sigh. Why are these lights not bigger?
Just make it the size of a 60″ television.
Or send the signal electronically to the cars.
You know, just like the indycars have in a yellow zone.
Also I don’t buy the safety car passing by story.
How come 1 second later the light DID went green?
Did the whole safety-car pack roll by in 1 second? I don’t think so.
What was the reason the lights were red?
Duh, It was because of the last few cars behind the safetycar……
It was the pack passing. Bear in mind they all dived into the pits once the pit lane had opened while following the safety car, there were still drivers a way back behind that had to catch up. So the pack would still be passing, but the very tail of it. That was the reason for the red light. That’s the reason Massa, Fisi and Montoya have been disqualified from this race in the past, and may have caught out Hamilton if no-one was there in front judging by his speed.
Afterwards Hamilton said:
P5ycH0, I would expect it was because of the safety car and other cars going past. We’ve had drivers not see or ignore red lights at Montreal in 2005 and 2007 under very similar circumstances.
i was juggling other things while watching and don’t really multi task well so forgive me for being stupid, but when they opened the pits for refueling, didn’t everyone already know the safety car was out? surely they don’t close pit exit every time the safety car goes by?
i think there were a couple of things in play here: a. dumb to close the exit when everyone already knows the sc is out on track-especially when the pit gets that busy, i mean that was asking for a pile-up b. whoever is talking to the driver while they’re in the pit should know & advise them the exit is closed c.hamilton made a really silly error by not paying better attention, but i’m sure with the traffic in that pit lane he was distracted. i’m not giving the kid a pass here, personally i was laughing my tukas off even though it was one of my guys he hit, but let’s face it plenty of world champions with several years of experience behind them have done silly stuff.
video being taken down from youtube in 5… 4…. 3…. 2…
Why not leave the pits closed until everyone is lined up behind the safety car? It just seems stupid to not allow a car back on track from the pits at any time. Red flag the race then. (Not a Lewis or Kimi fan)
It was no Hamilton fault at all.. In fact that guys that seem to be called drivers?… ejem… named Raikkonen and Kubica should have stepped apart or even jump the red light when they saw coming a future world champion at meteor full speed. They must receive a penalty inmediatly, 5 or 6 races freezed would be fantastic. And they should come and offer our beloved and glorious Hami half the WDC points they have at this moment just to remember they can’t do this again. I’ve said.
Steve K - They do leave the pits closed until they’re all lined up. Once they’ve done that, the pitlne is opened and drivers can pit. Some drivers choose not to and stay behind the safety car. They continue around on the track and over the pitlane exit. Until the last car still behind the safety car has left the designated area that would be dangerous for joinging drivers to enter at if cars are coming past, the re dlight at the end of the pit lane stops the drivers from coming abck on the track.
Both Hamilton and Rosberg docked ten grid slots for the French Grand Prix as a penalty, says grandprix.com
So basically what I am being told is humans driving cars with steering wheels are incapable of driving them next to each other at slow speeds. No wonder there isn’t much passing in this sport.
From the replay in rosbergs car, i had trouble seeing the light… it’s just around that little bend… and not that big.. not to say Lewis isn’t at fault, but it’s a human error.
Indeed a big miscur for Lewis…I don’t think it was intentional, but perhaps he could have kept his head a bit better and been more alert of the situation. It’s easy to say these things while tuning in at home, but still….coulden’t he see the cars stopped at the pit exit?
The red light also stops confusion being caused by coing back on the track in the middle of the pack; where would they be in the queue if they came out in the middle of the pack, bearing in mind they miss a corner coming from the pits…
lol architron! if hamilton was a ferrari driver i’m sure that’s exactly what would happen now…well, maybe not-is max actually speaking to luca these days?
steve-that was my question- had the sc been out for a full lap at that point? that’s the part i missed. it took them forever to decide on dispatching it.
Hamilton usually doesn’t make mistakes, but when he has one… It’s huge!!!!!
After China and Brazil, now this
Lewis has style ******* it up
Applauses
Hamilton penalised ten places on the grid in France
Lewis was joking before the race in an interview about how did his dad crash at 30mph, well his at 50mph is a little more public and sure hell of alot more expensive….atleast he can keep watching his and work it out, hopefully not looking back at the end of the season and seeing it might have cost him the title. Nice 2 see another team fighting thou, even if i’am a merc nut and it’s bmw lol.
Is this penalty confirmed or still speculation??
Dorian - all the major news sites are reporting it.
Lewis’ team should have informed him about the red light due to the configuration of the Montreal track but that doesn’t in any way excuse his mistake. Even if Lewis had stopped in time, Rosberg would have clobbered him even harder and put him out of the race anyway.
Good for Kimi for showing restraint. Imagine if it had been Schumi or Nelson Piquet senior.
Cheers Keith/David
Autosport reporting hamilton and rosberg 10 place grid penalty for magny cours
http://www.formula1.com/news/headlines/2008/6/7902.html
Hamilton and Rosberg get 10 place penalty, I think its harsh on Rosberg as the time and space he had to react would have been greater if lewis hadn’t have farced that incident out. Hamilton deserves the penalty and I know kimi took out Sutil but that was a wet race in Monaco, besides, Sutil would have got a 25 second penalty for overtakin double yellows.
Loved Kimi’s reaction, just pointing out the red light to lewis.
10 place grid penalty?
If Hamilton had run the red light, he’d have been black flagged. As it was his race ended anyway because he missed the red light and wrecked his car.
Because he hit a (red) car, his next race is ruined too.
Surely the penalty for failing to obey a red light is a black flag - if your race is over, that should be the end of it.
Well done Robert, hope to see him keep the pressure up in the driver’s championship. I’d be pleased to see Lewis win the title, I’d be over the moon if it was Robert.
Also, great to see DC on the podium again.
AJ - The FIA did deny that Sutil would have gotten a penalty.
I don’t understand your point about Rosberg - he had more time to react than Hamilton because he got their later, surely?
But regardless if drivers have difficulty seeing these lights (and going on past experience they certainly seem to) both their teams should have told them the exit light was red.
This incident was clearly a terrible blunder on the part of Lewis Hamilton, the light was obviously red, as Raikkonen and Kubica stopped in time well before Hamilton arrived on the scene.
In my opinion, this mistake was out of frustration on the part of Hamilton. McLaren, in my belief, made a big mistake by not bringing Lewis in to the pits before the safety car.
When you see the Force India car of Adrian Sutil parked up with the front tyres smouldering, a reasonable amount of time passed between that moment and the safety car being deployed. Going on the assumption that a safety car was imminent, and that Lewis was running light on super soft tyres, why not bring him in straight away?
As we all know, a team cannot add fuel to a car during a safety car period.
I believe that this indecision from McLaren contributed towards the crash, as Lewis saw his race lead evaporate behind the safety car.
If Lewis delibrately crashed into Raikkonen, we’ll never know? If he, i.e Lewis, had avoided the Ferrari, he would have crossed the white line and that would have been that. Remember what happened with Massa here last year.
I would love to have been a fly on the wall inside the McLaren garage between Sutil’s retirement and the pit lane crash.
I think a penalty is going to be given, and when looking over and over at the video of the crash, I think it is justified.
Like in China last year, McLaren and Hamilton dithered, and it cost them big time!!
the krut
I can understand McClaren’s decision because Sutil’s car was parked in a fairly safe place and some time passed before it became clear that his car was on fire and that marshals would have to go on to the track to extinguish it. By which time it was too late.
McLaren has suggested the penalty is harsh given that Raikkonen was not punished for hitting Sutil in Monaco.
I don’t agree. Raikkonen lost control of his car. If he hadn’t hit Sutil he’d have hit the barrier. Hamilton clearly did not leave himself enough time and space to stop his car in time (and the same goes for Rosberg).
Completely agree Keith. If Raikkonen had been punished then they’d have had to punish Alonso and many others too. McClaren should just suck it up and work out how they can get Lewis some points from 13th/14th on the grid in France.