When Verstappen started his first flying lap in Q1, it was quickly over as the rear axle completely locked out. “I don’t know why that happened or how that happened.” he said after the session, quoted by official F1 website. “I’ve never experienced something like that before in my career. The rear axle just completely locked on, then of course you can’t save that anymore at that speed.” he added.

In an interview with Sky Sports F1 he said, that from his point of view it already went wrong before downshift because he hit the pedal. “As soon as you hit the pedal, you quite quickly downshift, but it already immediately locked on the peak of the brake pressure.” It was surely something weird for him to experience.

As he got out of the car after he ended up in barriers, he was clearly checking his hands: “The barrier hit was not that bad, the wheel just snapped out of my hands and that’s why I had to go to the medical centre, but all good.” Even though Verstappen is gladly uninjured, his mechanics have plenty of work on his car. It needs to be ready on Sunday by 15:00 local time as the Grand Prix starts.

Of course, there are so many unknowns for Verstappen and his team that they have to sort out: “We’ll see tomorrow what we can do.”