Lando Norris had a car failure in first practice for the United States Grand Prix, he has admitted after it was revealed he caused the lock-up he tweeted about in the pre-season series. Norris, 19, drove at the Nürburgring to set the first qualifying lap of the United States Grand Prix’s pre-season series, but the change at Turn One meant he lost power and spun off.
Norris then smashed into a barrier in his Williams and sent the car spinning backwards. The full extent of the damage was revealed on Wednesday as his first practice session for the world’s oldest grand prix got underway, with only 20 minutes of practice to go before the first and second practice sessions.
In a typically childish post, Norris posted a picture of his car after the crash, with the caption: “Its only practice! Seems like the world has changed a lot since the year I turned F1.” He later deleted the post, however, with a tweet saying: “So sorry guys, got in trouble for saying we made mistakes so clearly it will take some explaining next time.”
News of the spectacular crash came as a surprise as it was suggested that Williams were not unhappy with Norris. The 13-year-old raced in the last US GP in 2016, and tested the new car in 2017, in front of 18,000 fans at the Donington Park circuit.
Leah Caiemara (@LeahCaiemara) We’ve built up our Williams @landorismackey for such a long time. Obviously if we saw this kind of thing in practice we would all be disappointed. However, he’s done so much time and effort getting ready for this race and if we allowed him to make mistakes we would totally just throw it all away #USGP #USGP #Williams
Toyota’s Kazuki Nakajima, also 19, crashed his Lotus, spin out and into the barriers, as he was preparing to start the second session.
