Remains of Grosjean's car put on display for first time

The burnt-out wreckage of the car Romain Grosjean crashed within 2020 will be on display at the F1 Exhibition in Madrid. Formula 1 has revealed on its official website images of the remains and looks back on that moment with Grosjean.

It was one of the most shocking moments of recent Formula 1: Grosjean's crash at the 2020 Bahrain Grand Prix. On the opening lap, the Haas driver collided with Daniil Kvyat's AlphaTauri, flew off the track, and crashed into the crash barrier at almost two hundred kilometres per hour. Grosjean's Haas immediately caught fire and the Frenchman was trapped in the flames for a total of 28 seconds before he managed to escape the blaze with the help of the marshals. Miraculously, Grosjean had only sustained some burns from the incident. Formula One reporter Olav Mol described it at the time as "a fatal accident without a fatal outcome".

The remains of the car are now on display for the first time. In a specially set-up area at the F1 Exhibition in Madrid, both halves of the car will be on display, exactly as they were after the fire was extinguished.

'That probably saved my life'

Grosjean himself was asked to reflect on the crash now that the remains are on display, and he stressed how extraordinary it is that such a large part of the car is still intact. "The chassis is still in one piece, the halo is there and apart from the damage and burn it is still as it should be. I guess that saved my life."

"From my point of view, it was a big accident but I didn’t realise the impact or how violent it was from the outside," Grosjean continued. "It was only the next day when I asked someone to show me what it looked like that I realized. My wife was actually watching that race with my dad and my kids. They will remember that moment their entire life. They were just spectators waiting to hear something… waiting to see something from Bahrain."