Mark Sutton//Motorsport Images
Grosjean hospitalized overnight but escapes serious injury
Romain Grosjean will stay in hospital overnight but appears to have escaped with no broken bones from his horrific crash at the start of the Bahrain Grand Prix.
The Frenchman hit the barrier head-on on the run to Turn 4 after veering across the track in front of Daniil Kvyat, with the impact penetrating the barrier and splitting the Haas in two. More worryingly, the force of the crash also resulted in an explosion and large fire that Grosjean managed to extract himself from, jumping clear with help from the FIA Medical Car team.
https://twitter.com/F1/status/1333103417347219457
Grosjean was treated for minor burns on his hands and feet at the circuit before being airlifted to hospital with suspected broken ribs, but Haas team principal Guenther Steiner says there appear to be no breaks.
“I just spoke with him, I just talked to him on the phone,” Steiner told Sky Sports. “He’s a clear state of mind. He’s good. He’s staying in the hospital overnight -- they want to keep him there. He told me and not the doctor, he feels good. It seems that nothing is broken. He’s got his hands bandaged from the burns. He was very upbeat I would say, very happy.”
Steiner believes Grosjean will even try to race in next weekend’s Sakhir Grand Prix at the same circuit if given the all-clear, but says the burns are likely to be a deciding factor.
“Absolutely (he’ll try and race) knowing him. He wants to be back but we will see tomorrow when we take the bandages off as he has no idea what they look like. At the moment, the only good thing is nothing bad happened. For sure, it wasn’t good but he’s safe, he’s healthy and the rest we speak tomorrow when we speak with the doctor.”
Steiner admits the whole situation was a difficult one for the team, as he tried to ensure the crew received accurate news quickly.
“It was hard but what we tried to do was to give immediately the good news that everything is fine, just inform them what is happening because they’re all shocked. As soon we knew he was OK I had the chief engineer on the radio to the whole team to say, ‘Guys, just calm down, Romain is out of the car, he’s good,’ and then the pictures came which spoke more than words.”
https://twitter.com/F1/status/1333127810353950722
Presented by:
Chris Medland
While studying Sports Journalism at the University of Central Lancashire, Chris managed to talk his way into working at the British Grand Prix in 2008 and was retained for three years before joining ESPN F1 as Assistant Editor. After three further years at ESPN, a spell as F1 Editor at Crash Media Group was followed by the major task of launching F1i.com’s English-language website and running it as Editor. Present at every race since the start of 2014, he has continued building his freelance portfolio, working with international titles. As well as writing for RACER, his broadcast work includes television appearances on F1 TV and as a presenter and reporter on North America's live radio coverage on SiriusXM.
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