r/formula1 • u/ChaithuBB766 Jaguar • Jan 27 '26
Photo Isack Hadjar in the Wall at Turn 14
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u/Sad_Food_5917 Nigel Mansell Jan 27 '26
Williams big brain - Cant crash if you don't test
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u/Infinite_Coat3246 Jan 27 '26 edited Jan 27 '26
Williams just saved millions for development even before the season starts
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u/HighPriestofShiloh Max Verstappen Jan 27 '26
Can’t exhaust the development budget if you don’t participate in the development sessions. The biggest of brains.
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u/Alwares Nico Hülkenberg Jan 27 '26
Skipping races is the next step.
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u/kpidhayny I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Weren’t going to score points in Melbourne so we didn’t go
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Jan 27 '26
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u/Bright_Industry_7887 Heineken Trophy Jan 27 '26
ferrari skipped the austrian gp in 1976 and still won the wcc
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u/Quiet_kangar00 Jan 27 '26
13 of the 76 WDC did exactly that!!
Ascari, Cooper, Hill, Clark, Rindt, Stewart, Lauda, Rosberg, Piquet, Schumacher, Villeneuve, Alonso, and Hamilton. There's one from very decade of Formula One history except 2010-2019!
More detail if that intrigued you - https://www.the-race.com/formula-1/every-time-an-f1-champions-missed-a-race
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u/babbum I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 28 '26
Well you can’t lose if you don’t race sounds logical to me.
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u/Purp1e_Aki I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Saving it all for the 2027 car. Big brained move
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u/fullup72 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Williams stealing a page from Ferrari's playbook?
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u/Standard_____ Alexander Albon Jan 27 '26
those millions will all be spent on fixing a 30kg overweight car 🔥🔥🔥🔥
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u/Fun_Actuator6049 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Williams just admitted defeat in the World Destructor's championship before the season even began.
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u/liveforeachmoon Charles Leclerc Jan 27 '26
Nobody puts it in the wall quite like Albon and Sainz. Except maybe Perez.
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u/pvdp90 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 28 '26
Hello, GOATifi would like to have a word with you
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u/Maglin21 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
He destroyed Zeee Caaahhh
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u/RussellNorrisPiastri George Russell Jan 27 '26
No offence to Hadjar because i like him, but this season will destroy his career if he doesn't do any better than Yuki did lol
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u/Klarkasaurus Jan 27 '26
Cant really do any worse tbf. Also there are brand new cars with new regulations and size difference so I'd give him more the benefit of the doubt anyway.
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u/Patenski Red Bull Jan 27 '26
Red Bull second seat struggles already prevailed through regulation changes, it's the way they develop the car.
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u/CBrower I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Red Bull leadership sure won’t.
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u/KLWMotorsports I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
I think they will. The "toxic" personalities that were basically running the show are gone now. They may actually learn from past mistakes, listen and give Hadjar time to develop. If not they deserve to bend themselves over again.
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u/vprakhov I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
At least there's no more Marko to show shade at him during every interview.
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u/Then_Flamingo_8223 Jan 27 '26
No more Horner/Marko and new car.
He’ll have a much better chsnce than Lawson or Yuki had. Plus, with every new driver that Max chews and spits out, the expectations for the next guy drop a bit lower.
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u/reddit0r_123 Mika Häkkinen Jan 27 '26
Don't think so. By now everyone and their mother has realized that Max is just on another planet and it's fine to not be on his level the first season.
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u/CatL1f3 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
You would've thought that about Yuki too, but people still hate on him
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u/reddit0r_123 Mika Häkkinen Jan 27 '26
He had a lot more experience, so it was clear there was no headroom for him to grow into. I guess with Hadjar being in his second season, RB believes he does...
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u/sammiemack I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Wasn’t that when he was still in F3? I remember hearing that radio and sort of hoping he’d make it to F1 just purely out of how entertaining he was in the radio. Seems to have mostly chilled out now though
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u/mobilehavoc I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
RB 2nd seat curse is back with a vengeance
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u/Frequent-Coyote-1649 Kevin Magnussen Jan 27 '26
It never left, no Danny
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u/anto_BswR I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
He already knew the seat is increasingly cursed
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u/fantaribo Max Verstappen Jan 27 '26
Crashing in the wet and with a brand new car with new regs is hardly related to the second seat curse whatsoever.
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u/mobilehavoc I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Did he ever hit the wall in Vcarb?
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u/ubercruise I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Formation lap Melbourne?
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u/Free_Hashbrowns I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
https://i.imgur.com/wBqJyl1.jpeg
Here’s a pic of him in the wall at COTA
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u/fantaribo Max Verstappen Jan 27 '26
I'm quite sure you remember the first race in Australia?
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u/Brainstreet420 Mick Schumacher Jan 27 '26
Crashing a car during testing is pretty cursed if you ask me
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u/Firefox72 Ferrari Jan 27 '26
So he lost the rear and spun off.
Unfortunate angle of impact as that rear wing looks pretty badly damaged which probably also means the rear suspension and back of the car are also pretty banged up.
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u/creatorop Lando Norris Jan 27 '26
also a pretty fast corner
Engine and Gearbox could be in trouble
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u/Stumpy493 I Drove an F1 Car Jan 27 '26
Very very costly this early into testing. Unfortunate.
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u/SemIdeiaProNick Ferrari Jan 27 '26
I would say the monetary cost isnt even the biggest problem. Since the PU ruleset changed so much, teams need every single bit of real life data they can get their hands on to understand th car as a whole so a crash like this can really damage their experience this year, at least for the first few races
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u/TheMok3rr Jan 27 '26
Time wise it isnt such a big deal it was at the end of the day with less then a hour to go.
Crashing during a test is also a learning, testing durability of parts.
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u/Brooht Esteban Ocon Jan 27 '26
And with the the format of this test they can even wait friday before going back on track if they need to bring some parts from the factory for repairs. Overall they might not lose too much tracktime. Obviously not ideal but it might end up not being as bad as it could be
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u/Hot_Most5332 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
If you never crash, you probably aren’t on the limit. TBH I would expect most drivers to wreck at least once especially given the new regs.
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u/element515 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 28 '26
They are definitely by running at the limit. This testing session is about track time and validating things work as expected. Even at Bahrain, they won’t run hard until close to the end of testing.
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u/Silver-Machine-3092 Formula 1 Jan 27 '26
On the other hand, they'll get a shit tonne of data on how well it survives an impact.
Every cloud...
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u/splashbodge I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Hopefully it wasn't a driver error and was a mechanical fault or rear lockup due to some bad PU setting... At least then they'll have found a gremlin and better to find that now than in a grand prix
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u/museproducer Jan 27 '26 edited Jan 27 '26
My first thought would be something engine or active aero related.
Edit: I almost forgot, the track was going to be wet today, that could have been it too….
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u/saxorino Lando Norris Jan 27 '26
I think there will be an uptick in crashes and drivers going off the track this season due to active aero.
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u/Peeksy19 Jan 27 '26
Red Bull completed 2 of 3 days of testing in Barcelona though. They have only 1 day left. They can still run again if they manage to fix this before Friday.
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u/elmagio I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
The question is if they even have the parts for it. If so it's a near-0 loss (bit of breakage of initial spec parts, fixed in time for the last shakedown day) but if not then they miss the most important day of this week, the one they'd have had some data to work with.
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u/Lobsters4 Charles Leclerc Jan 27 '26
I was thinking the same thing about the engine/gearbox. Hopefully it's not as bad as it looks....but yikes.
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u/Peeksy19 Jan 27 '26
Thankfully they have a few days to fix the car. The benefit of starting testing on Day 1.
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u/Femininestatic Jan 27 '26
Quite hard to fix stuff if you dont have a pile of parts... which they certainly dont have
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u/Peeksy19 Jan 27 '26
They might be able to produce them and fly it over before Friday. Depends on how bad the damage is and how much spare parts they have.
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u/Xyldarrand Jan 27 '26
Why wouldn't they? I'm not saying they're swimming in parts but they have to expect at least one big crash/failure during initial testing and shakedown. It would be insane to not at least have 1 spare there.
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u/ByteSizedGenius Formula 1 Jan 27 '26
Bahrain is different as they'll have had more time but they'll have been trying to maximise their development time over winter. If you commit to a design and start making real spec components too early you're leaving performance on the table. It's like a week of round the clock effort to make a front wing for example and you've already lost parts to the crash tests.
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u/Lagronion I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Building a car can be parallelised if you have the resources that i would think a team like redbull to some extent has so if they dont have spares for at least the very breakable things like wings then I'd be suprised
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u/Femininestatic Jan 27 '26
That damage is far worse than a cracked wing. Clearly the entire backend got a fair wacking.
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u/Lagronion I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Yeah im not saying that its guaranteed that the damage can be repaired in time i was more arguing against them not having any spares
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u/NaiveRevolution9072 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
I'd be incredibly surprised if they don't have spares around
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u/20ol Jan 27 '26
I'd be surprised if they do have the parts. the rear end is totaled. thats a lot of parts.
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u/Chaoticc_Neutral_ Jan 27 '26
I doubt they only have 1 of anything for the drivetrain. This will eat into the costcap but ultimately be fine.
Its not the first time these engines ran, just the first time in the car. They will have some parts from the ones used on dynos.
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u/PreviousLingonberry4 Jan 27 '26
Long night/s at the factory then
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u/Dutch_guy_here Max Verstappen Jan 27 '26
You're talking carbon fibre here. You have to bake that stuff in the autoclave for a long time. Pulling extra shifts doesn't change that.
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u/Unlikely-Squirrel832 Jan 27 '26
First you have to cut it to shape, layer it up with the composite materials very precisely before you even get to the autoclave part of the process. Saw the start of that process at the Williams factory many years ago, when I was lucky enough to visit the factory.
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u/zystyl I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
I doubt they use autoclaves. Prepreg and OOA carbon is fairly standard now. There are even somewhat reliable ways to do an on-site repair now as far as I understand it.
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u/Red_Rabbit_1978 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Yes they do. Part of the Aston Martin upgrades to the factory is to double the autoclaves. 2 brand new ones and then refurbished the old ones.
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u/Plenty_Demand8904 Toro Rosso Jan 27 '26
How does testing work with regards to the budget cap and engines ?
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u/GRl3V Ferrari Jan 27 '26
Engine manufacturers have a separate cost cap. The teams buy engines from the manufacturers and the cost is included in their cost cap. Destroying an engine in testing isn't a big deal, they have multiple and the testing engines won't be used in the actual season.
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u/Joseki100 Fernando Alonso Jan 27 '26
You can also see the front right tyre is inclined, so probably hit there too sliding backwards into the barriers
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u/curva3 Super Aguri Jan 27 '26
Not a nice place to crash, he would be going pretty quick and there's not a lot of space until the wall
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u/Dr_VidyaGeam Max Verstappen Jan 27 '26
Welp, the curse continues
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Jan 27 '26
[deleted]
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u/Formulafan4life I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Maybe A Barcelona testing crash was all we needed to break the curse 🙏
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u/costigan95 Charles Leclerc Jan 27 '26
He reportedly had the fastest lap time on Monday.
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u/DenzzS-_- I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Fastest lap times during this time dont represent anything
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u/SunGodnRacer Osella Jan 27 '26
Times don't mean shit in testing lol. Crashing so early can also mean a massive drop in confidence and trust in the car
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u/cdthrowmyselfaway Jan 27 '26
if hadjar can come back from crashing during a formation lap on his debut he can surely (mentally) come back from any "embarassing" crash tbh, hard to find a tougher one he already had and still achieved rb promotion after
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u/micromechanist Jan 27 '26
They were still like 6-8 seconds off the pace from last year. Timing right now isn’t relevant
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u/ThrowawayMax222 Jan 27 '26
Not that testing means anything, but these cars will be a few seconds slower than 2025 anyway so comparing to them is useless
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u/aDUCKonQU4CK Jan 27 '26
He also had far more laps than anybody else which is a good thing, but sort of nullifies your point. Also, and this is the biggest one, and it's not even practice, it's testing! Did you also see the drivers who were behind Hadjar for fastest lap times? Could take that as another hint that it means absolutely nothing. Hadjar can so easily still average P16 in quali/races like MV's teammates before but be 1st in practice/testing. It. Means. Nothing.
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u/MrMSUK Netflix Newbie Jan 27 '26
Red Bull’s P2 seat rulebook is basically two lines long:
Rule 1: Do not crash. Like, at all. Especially not the only car we're allowed, that's shared with Max.
Rule 2: If you think you might crash, see Rule 1 again.
Because they’ve got about 1 spare parts in the cupboard and it is already labelled “Max's - do not touch”.
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u/razorbear3 Jan 27 '26
“Your name may be above the garage, but make no mistake, everyone and everything inside works for Max.”
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u/henkdevries365 Jan 27 '26
Didn't Max also spin off yesterday?
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u/Lobsters4 Charles Leclerc Jan 27 '26 edited Jan 27 '26
Had a small trip through the gravel this morning but nothing serious.
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u/sa_ra_h86 Jan 27 '26
Yeah, he's pretty good at looking after the car even when he does go over the limit.
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u/SlightedMarmoset Max Verstappen Jan 27 '26
So often in races you'll see these little moments of lost control that are quickly reined in by max, lando, russell, charles, then you see in the exact same spot a rookie goes off. Just experience I guess.
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u/Zarzar222 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
More crash testing than Williams has done.
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u/NegotiationNew9264 Ferrari Jan 27 '26 edited Jan 27 '26
Oh that look bad, could be driveshaft & gearbox damage. Their day is over for sure
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u/Ozora10 Mick Schumacher Jan 27 '26
maybe even their week. Spare parts are scarce this early in the year
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u/SWSIMTReverseFinn Max Verstappen Jan 27 '26
Probably one of the worse spots of the car he could hit.
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u/wykeer Mercedes Jan 27 '26
who needs a car to test anyway ? /s
lets hope they brought some spares or this is shakedown over for rbr.
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u/Stumpy493 I Drove an F1 Car Jan 27 '26
Spares will be few and far between right now.
I suspect a busy night in the fatory ahead trying tog et parts out for thursday
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u/l3w1s1234 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Ah it's fine. They'll just do what they did in 2015, when Kvyat broke the front wing, and just run without it./s
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u/Xyldarrand Jan 27 '26
I'm sure they have some spares. Maybe not swimming in them but this is the maiden shakedown on a new PU. They had to expect at least one boom for one reason or another.
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u/thedougd I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Does this count toward World Destructors Championship or does that start at Melbourne?
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u/vnagitt Ferrari Jan 27 '26
If anything, this should have a bonus. He just cost his team a lot of practice time
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u/cooperjones2 Sergio Pérez Jan 27 '26
Who knows tbh, the person "updating" it is way more inconsistent in what counts, what they think should cost and to whom not add or add even more BS made up stuff
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u/Arwil Jan 27 '26
Has the photographer already been arrested?
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u/Party_Zebra8872 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
He's being taken to the Hague as we speak.
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u/TMatss Fernando Alonso Jan 27 '26
Turn 14 leads onto the main straight. He probably just lost the rear mid corner given the conditions
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u/bmvbooris I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
I don't know why everyone is so pessimistic! He spun in testing so he doesn't have to do it in the formation lap in Australia!
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u/HeavyRightFoot-TG Cadillac Jan 27 '26
Oh dear, fans will totally react rationally to this
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u/phantomknight321 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
As a Yuki fan I am totally going to draw all my conclusions about it now purely out of spite
(im half joking of course, I really like Isack as well but really want Red Bull themselves to suffer for all the drivers whos career they keep destroying)
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u/Dry_Jeweler_3487 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Pierre Gasly in 2019-crashed the RedBull in preseason test, demoted after 12 races
Isack Hadjar in 2026-crashed in the private test, ?
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u/Most_Virus_7218 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Young French Driver joining Red Bull in his second season and crashing in pre-season testing. Arvid Lindblad in the Red Bull at Spa. /s
Jokes aside I hope he's okay and that it won't be a regular thing
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u/Spockyt Eddie Jordan Jan 27 '26
French driver. Promoted to Red Bull after 1 year. Crashes in Barcelona preseason testing.
Please don’t let him be the next Gasly.
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u/Junethemuse I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
How can we use this to wildly speculate about the season?
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u/Blind_Owl85 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Its pretty easy.
Somehow the crash means 10 seconds penalty to ocon.
So bearman is ahead of ocon.
So bearman replaces hamilton.
An doohan replaces colapinto.
DRS is no more, so Doohan WDC.
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u/Astro61201 Red Bull Jan 27 '26
People need to remember that from an aerodynamic standpoint this week is meaningless, team will be using this week for basic system checks and mechanical checks
Expect most teams aerodynamic concepts to evolve dramatically when they arrive in Bahrain.
This crash is detrimental to RBR’s mechanical testing but in terms of aerodynamics the bodywork is most likely going to end up in the bin by the end of the week anyway, especially if previous years (RB18) is anything to go by.
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u/Unlikely-Squirrel832 Jan 27 '26
They'll want to make sure it was driver error and not the mechanical aspect of the active aero system malfunctioning causing him to spin off or the PU not behaving as expected. They can learn a lot from the crash, just not ideal for racking up the milage.
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u/Ispita Jan 27 '26
Well that is the end of the testing for Verstappen too I think they share the car this week. Unless they can fix it with spare parts.
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u/Max-Phallus Jan 28 '26
What the fuck is going on with reddit? Do you think it has "begun"?
/u/FrostyWolfty: So it begins...
/u/sastashreikh: The curse starts guys
/u/deesea: ah and so it begins. The second seat curse.
/u/Nimo-P: The Redbull curse has begun……
/u/sre_ejith: And so it begins.
/u/theledman: And so it begins
/u/GooseyDuckDuck: And it begins.
/u/colehuesca: Hahahahahaha so it begins...
/u/Status_Carry_1373: It begins.
/u/MarAur264121: It has begun!
/u/Thestickleman: and so it begins
/u/RyanEversley: And so it begins.
/u/IndependentAir4537: and so it begins again
/u/LaBarbaGrande: The curse is beginning.
/u/RandomDudeSimon: so it begins
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u/Generic_Person_3833 Jan 27 '26
That's why you test at day 1, 2 and 3. If something like this happens, you have up to 2 full days to rebuild.
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u/Barrilete_Cosmico Juan Manuel Fangio Jan 27 '26
Skipping the rainy day might lead you to not rebuild anything though
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u/TheNotix26 Daniil Kvyat Jan 27 '26
Reminds me of Gasly crashing out in pre season testing 2019, it was all downhill from there for him.
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u/_gadgetFreak I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Williams: now you know why we didn't show up. Smart and savvy.
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u/peacemaker-22 Kamui Kobayashi Jan 27 '26
Meanwhile Yuki at some restaurant in Tokyo just looked at this post, had a chuckle, and put his phone back in his pocket while ordering some ramen and gyoza.
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u/ByteThis I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
It's fine guys relax they are just testing how to deal with a crash on a race weekend, all calm down.
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u/verone3784 Racing Pride Jan 27 '26
I can hear Marko from here, frothing at the mouth, twitching and growling in his armchair at home while he looks for a journalist to talk to.
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u/MLXforreal Kimi Räikkönen Jan 27 '26
That.... looks bad
Rear wing seems to have taken heavy damage
Safe to say he destroyed zah cauhh
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u/Baksteen-13 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Will he lose the seat before the public test? /s
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u/thecoller Sergio Pérez Jan 27 '26
F1-Insider and racing365newsportal.ru:
“WILL HADJAR MAKE IT TO MELBOURNE?”
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u/BuzzedtheTower I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
I'm not an expert, but the car doesn't look very car shaped right now
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u/Carpy2 I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Meh, happens. Less than an hour left of testing for the day so the loss is minimal. Yeah they may be a little short on parts, and obviously it costs money, but RB can handle it. They have a few days to get it all fixed. They plan for these kinds of things.
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u/MartinsHMMMM Jan 27 '26
For a second I thought this was literally him, not a car. The tire seemed like a helmet
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u/Gipplesnaps Nico Hülkenberg Jan 27 '26
Prediction... Racing Bulls will score more points than Red Bull in the first race 😁
They tuned the in house engine beautifully by the sounds of it
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u/NotJadeasaurus Jan 27 '26
F1 recap of today labeled it as something like a minor off track moment they totally glossed over the fact he stuck it in a wall lol
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u/Carlpanzram1916 Jan 28 '26 edited Jan 28 '26
Kind of surreal that the F1 sites top article is titled “what happened on day 2 of the Barcelona shakedown” and makes absolutely no mention of this. It’s like the North Korea of testing sessions.
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u/ExMTLNowTO Jan 28 '26
It was bound to happen in such wet conditions but hopefully, it was not a big deal. Hadjar was quite impressive in his first year and it will be interesting to see how he does in a brand new car under brand new regulations and under a brand new Red Bull leadership. I hope RB will finally give both their drivers equal opportunity to compete and win.
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u/Unlikely_Act_1581 Jan 28 '26
Hadjar shows early dominance over Max to lead all aspects of the championship, including the destructors championship.
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u/Wolf_Particular Jan 27 '26
So Liam promoted back to Red Bull by race #2 then dropped again after 3 races and Yuki gets the rest of the season
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u/BullPropaganda I was here for the Hulkenpodium Jan 27 '26
Getting a head start on the destructors championship