Lewis Hamilton’s nightmare season at Ferrari went from bad to worse on Saturday as he crashed out of practice ahead of qualifying in Abu Dhabi.
The 40-year-old Ferrari driver, who is without a podium this season, inexplicably lost control of his car in the middle of the third and final practice session.
Hamilton, who has won a record five times at the Yas Marina Circuit, spun at turn nine and slammed into the barriers.
“Something buckled at the front and snapped the rear,” he told race engineer Riccardo Adami over team radio. Hamilton apologised to his team – retrieving a damaged section of his front wing and putting it on top of his wrecked car – before heading back to the pit lane on the back of a moped.
While the Ferrari mechanics fixed the car in time for qualifying, the seven-time world champion was knocked out in Q1 for the third race running. He will start Sunday’s race in 16th place.
“Every time mate,” Hamilton told Adami. “I’m so sorry.”
Nico Rosberg, the 2016 F1 world champion and Hamilton’s former teammate at Mercedes, labelled the Briton’s fortunes at the moment as a “nightmare.”
His spin in practice came before championship hopeful Lando Norris finished second, just four thousandths of a second behind Mercedes’ George Russell. Max Verstappen was third, 0.124 seconds off the pace with Oscar Piastri fifth.
Hamilton has endured a nightmare few weeks, failing to progress beyond Q1 in qualifying in his last three attempts. In Las Vegas a fortnight ago, he qualified last on the grid.
The seven-time world champion is currently sixth in the championship standings and is facing his first season without a podium. His replacement at Mercedes, teenager Kimi Antonelli, is only 15 points behind him in the leaderboard.
Hamilton labelled his year the “worst season ever” in Vegas, while in Qatar he qualified 18th on the grid and finished outside the top-10.
Hamilton and Leclerc recently played down words from Ferrari chairman John Elkann four weeks ago, which encouraged the star driver pairing to “talk less and focus on driving.”
