Eight years ago, Fernando Alonso's big scare

Starting from eleventh position on the starting grid, Fernando Alonso hoped to get into the points with his McLaren, for the first round of the 2016 season of Formula 1. After a first pit stop on lap 11, the Spaniard found himself stuck behind Esteban Gutiérrez and his Haas. The American team competed there in its first Grand Prix in F1. On the 17th lap of the event, Gutiérrez and Alonso collided, sending the two-time world champion into the wall at Turn 3, before he took off into the gravel and rolled twice.

Alonso's car came to rest, upside down, against the wall in the loophole, leaving a small space for the Spaniard to extricate himself from his wreckage. After a tour of the medical center, the pilot number 14 appeared in front of the cameras, shocked but standing up.

“I am very happy to be alive and to be able to talk to you”, did he declare. “I am very grateful to the FIA ​​for the safety of these cars, we will try to learn from today and make sure this does not happen again. I remember everything, unfortunately! It would be nice to be able to erase everything, but everything happened quite slowly in the car, because you're flying, you're being shaken, you see the sky, the ground, the sky... You know exactly where you are. The car then stopped, I saw a gap and I got out because my mother is watching TV and I wanted her to see that I'm okay. »

Esteban Gutiérrez came to make sure Fernando Alonso was okay. © DPPI

Authorized to leave the circuit and Australia by FIA doctors, it was only upon his arrival in Spain that Fernando Alonso began to feel the pain following his accident. The result: broken ribs and a pneumothorax.

Enough to prevent him from participating in the Bahrain Grand Prix, organized two weeks later. It was the opportunity for Belgian driver Stoffel Vandoorne to make his debut in Formula 1, with a tenth place finish and a first point. Alonso was able to get back behind the wheel during the Chinese Grand Prix, the third round of the 2016 championship.

A victory for Nico Rosberg and points “like a victory” for Romain Grosjean

On the Melbourne side, Nico Rosberg managed to defeat the Ferrari de Sebastian Vettel (second) and Kimi Räikkönen (forced to retire) to win the first Grand Prix of the season. A victory which will lead to three others in a row, in Bahrain, China and Russia. Four victories as a foundation towards his first and only world title, acquired at the end of the season in Abu Dhabi.

If Haas lost one of its two cars at the start of the race, the red flag following the Gutiérrez-Alonso collision allowed Romain Grosjean to change tires, without losing positions. The Frenchman managed to cross the finish line in sixth position, an unexpected result for a Haas team which was discovering Formula 1. Two weeks later, Grosjean had the luxury of finishing in fifth position...

ALSO READ > Mercedes signs Simone Resta for 2025