Massive Sargeant crash wipes out most of final Dutch GP practice

Alpine driver Pierre Gasly topped final Formula 1 practice ahead of qualifying for the Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort, but Logan Sargeant’s massive accident was the main talking point of the session given it led to a 44-minute red flag that heavily limited the running.

The Williams driver hit the barrier heavily at Turn 4 after 14 minutes.

He had set the fifth-fastest time in the early wet running when he touched the grass at the end of the exit kerb of the Turn 3 left-hander.

This pitched the car momentarily to the right, with Sargeant’s attempt to correct resulting in the Williams being fired across the track and spinning heavily into the barrier on the left-hand side of the track in the following right-hand kink.

This led to significant damage and a lengthy clean-up operation. 

The heavily-upgraded Williams suffered substantial damage to the right side of the car and rear end in particular, with fire breaking out as a result of the impact.

It’s unclear what effect this crash will have on the rest of Sargeant's weekend, both in terms of the scale of the repair and whether he can participate in qualifying (which seems unlikely) and also what specification he can run when he does return to the track.

Team principal James Vowles confirmed Williams has a spare monocoque available and that the damage “looks pretty serious and that could result in a chassis change”.

Williams has sufficient spares available to run Sargeant in the upgraded spec after repairs, but Vowles said the team will have to take a view on whether it wants to risk further new parts.

 “There’s a limited amount [of the parts],” Vowles told Sky, “so if something happens now to the other car you need to make sure in parc ferme you have enough spares.

“That’s more what I want to evaluate now - when under parc ferme condition can we service both cars?”

NEW JEOPARDY FOR SARGEANT?

The crash is the latest blow in a trying season for 23-year-old Sargeant, who won’t continue as a race driver with Williams next year following the signing of Carlos Sainz.

He needs to make the most of the remaining races in an attempt either to keep a foothold of some form in F1 or earn a ride in another category next year, but such an elementary error is not helping his cause.

There also remain persistent rumours about the possibility of Williams replacing him before the end of the season given the need to maximise its points in the constructors’ championship and this hardly helps his case.

Vowles called on Sargeant to understand the accident and "compartmentalise" it so he can avoid a repeat of such mistakes.

However, there’s no doubt that he will be privately intensely frustrated with Sargeant’s error.

“You’ve got to compartmentalise what happened, so in other words, put it in a box, understand why it happened and what went wrong,” Vowles said.

“To me, it looked like he washed out, didn't realise there's grass there, put a wheel on the grass, which then effectively resulted in that huge accident.

“But put that into a box, what caused it, what materialised so you can’t repeat it again.

“The real expertise with Formula 1 drivers is they can typically do that with much smaller incidents by the next corner. So once we can do that, create the right mindset for him, we’ll get the most out of him tomorrow."

Sargeant was shuffled back down to 12th after the session resumed, while team-mate Alex Albon ended the session 14th fastest having not been able to start a flying lap after the restart.

HOW GASLY SET THE PACE

With just 16 minutes of green-flag running taking place during the session, barely any of those after the resumption, the laptimes were even less representative than usual.

Only 10 cars had posted a time before the red flag, all running intermediates, with Aston Martin driver Fernando Alonso fastest of that phase with a lap of 1m21.461s.

Everyone, except for Sargeant, headed out when the session was restarted with two minutes remaining. Only 14 drivers made it to the startline in time to set a flying lap with Lance Stroll, Albon, Daniel Ricciardo, Yuki Tsunoda and Sergio Perez all failing to do so. Eleven of those 14 set their best times on the last lap, including Max Verstappen who hadn't run before the red flag.

With damp conditions, the field on intermediates and the drivers jostling for position it was an untidy end to the session.

Kevin Magnussen briefly took top spot before being shuffled down to second by Gasly, who set a lap 0.139s faster than the Haas driver. Valtteri Bottas and Lando Norris both made it into the top four with late laps, although Alonso’s earlier lap was good enough for fifth. 

The session was so scruffy that it’s impossible to draw any meaningful conclusions ahead of qualifying.

HULKENBERG’S CONTINUING NIGHTMARE

Nico Hulkenberg started FP3 hoping to put his Friday troubles behind him, but any hope of an improved day took a hit – as did the nose of his car – early on.

On Friday, Hulkenberg had a number of off-track excursions while battling problems with the Haas’s brakes locking. That culminated in a crash at Turn 1 when the rear wheels locked suddenly when he touched the brakes.

Hulkenberg was yet to set a time today when he went off at Turn 11.

“It’s again the same as yesterday, I touched the brake and locked up”, he reported over the radio after the front-wing crunching impact. 

He was able to return to the pits, although he suffered substantial damage to his new-specification front wing.

He also returned to the track after the restart, setting his one and only flying lap of the session to end up ninth.