Jules Bianchi, 1989-2015

Jules Bianchi: 1989-2015

2015 F1 season

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Jules Bianchi’s underdog triumphs with the Marussia team, and a string of successes earlier in his career, had put him on the radar as a potential Ferrari driver of the future.

But a life which should have taken him to Maranello and beyond came to an end far too soon. Yesterday, nine months after a violent crash in the Japanese Grand Prix, Jules Bianchi passed away.

The 25-year-old was the second member of his family to compete in Formula 1. His uncle Lucien raced for Cooper in 1968 and the same year won the Le Mans 24 Hours with Pedro Rodriguez driving a Ford GT40. However he was killed the following year when his car struck a telegraph pole while practising on the La Sarthe track.

Twenty years later, Jules Bianchi was born in Nice. He got behind the wheel of a kart for the first time following his fifth birthday.

Success followed quickly and by 2007, having just scooped the WSK International Series crown, Bianchi began his first season in racing cars. The transition was almost seamless: He opened his account in the French Formula 2.0 championship with a second place, and by the end of the 13-round series he had clinched the crown with five wins, eleven podium finishes, and a lowest finish of fifth.

Bianchi was immediately snapped up by crack French outfit ART for promotion to F3 Euroseries in 2008. By the end of the season only team mate Nico Hulkenberg and Edoardo Mortara, both with a year’s experience under their belts, were ahead of him in the standings, and Bianchi had impressed by winning the annual Masters race.

Returning as clear favourite in 2009, Bianchi decisively took the title with nine wins – the most by any driver in the series since Lewis Hamilton, an especially impressive feat given the subsequent introduction of reverse-grid races.

Now Ferrari was showing an interest in the career of a driver who was being managed by Nicolas Todt, the son of former team principal Jean Todt. Bianchi joined the team’s young driver academy, and had his first test for them at the end of 2010.

While continuing to test for Ferrari, Bianchi graduated to GP2 with ART. As in 2008, he ended his first season third in the championship behind two more experienced drivers: Pastor Maldonado and Sergio Perez. Bianchi’s one-lap pace impressed: he took pole position for his first race and repeated the feat twice more during the year. But while he consistently featured among the points-scorers, Bianchi ended the year win-less.

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With a new chassis and tyre supplier arriving in the single-make series for 2011, much of Bianchi’s year one experienced was rendered irrelevant when he returned for a second season with ART. The result was, on paper, a near facsimile: third in the championship with 53 points, one more than he had managed the year before.

A poor start to the season had been Bianchi’s undoing. He tangled with eventual champion Romain Grosjean in Turkey, lost pole position to a yellow flag infringement in Spain, then collided with Giedo van der Garde at the start. He bounced back with victory at Silverstone – following a stirring scrap with former F3 rival Christian Vietoris – and from then on he took points in every race.

Bianchi grabbed the chance to gain F1 experience with Force India in 2012, making nine appearances in practice sessions during the course of the year. In the meantime he had switched to Formula Renault 3.5 in search of his first championship title in three years – and came agonisingly close to clinching it.

Again he suffered a frustrating start to the year – having finished second on the road at Motorland Aragon he was disqualified for a technical infringement on his car. The stewards found his limited-slip differential did not comply with the rules and 18 precious points were lost.

A close second to Sam Bird at Monaco and a repeat result in Spa got his season underway properly. A breakthrough victory at the Nurburgring soon followed, and with another win at a tricky wet/dry race at Silverstone set up a close three-way title battle between him, Bird and Robin Frijns.

Frijns appeared to crack under pressure at the Barcelona finale. On lap 20, Bianchi shocked his rival by diving for the inside at turn one and squeezing by. Now Frijns was under attack from Kevin Magnussen, and if those positions changed hands the title would have been Bianchi’s. But in a controversial twist, Frijns tried to re-pass Bianchi at turn four. The pair collided, and Frijns was champion.

However it was Bianchi who earned a graduation to Formula One, albeit not before another disappointment. Having originally been in the frame for a Force India drive, the team made a late decision to re-hire Adrian Sutil instead. That left Bianchi to team up with fellow rookie Max Chilton at the back-of-the-grid Marussia squad.

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The MR02 was far from an ideal vehicle with which to demonstrate his potential, but the 13th place finish Bianchi took in his second outing at Sepang proved vital – it guaranteed the team tenth place in the championship ahead of rivals Caterham.

They went one better the following year, again thanks to Bianchi. In Monaco, where in 1968 his uncle had taken the only podium finish of his F1 career, Bianchi dragged his Marussia into the top ten for the team’s first scoring finish. Because of those two points, Marussia ended the 2014 season with ninth place in the constructors’ championship ahead of Sauber and Caterham.

That ninth place and the prize money it earned the team ultimately helped them survive the financial difficulties which kept them from racing at the end of last year. Tragically, Bianchi would never know the full implications of his achievement.

Marussia’s penultimate appearance came at the Japanese Grand Prix, which took place in dire conditions. As rain fell late in the race Bianchi was holding off Sutil for 17th place, until the Sauber driver aquaplaned off into the barriers at the Dunlop Curve. The next time by, Bianchi’s car also got away from him, and he struck the crane which had been sent to recover Sutil’s car with huge force.

Bianchi was taken to Mie General Medical Center in Yokkaichi where he was found to have suffered serious brain injuries. The following month he was taken back to France, but as he continued to show little signs of improvement the situation grew ever more grave.

“It’s unbearable, it’s a daily torture,” his father told the media earlier this week. “We sometimes feel like we’re going crazy, because for me, it certainly is more terrible than if he had died.”

Bianchi’s struggle ended yesterday. He passed away less than a month before what would have been his 26th birthday.

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Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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66 comments on “Jules Bianchi: 1989-2015”

  1. Sportsperson or not, no man deserves to die so young and no parent ever should have to bury their own children.

  2. HamiltonNumber1
    18th July 2015, 12:53

    Gutted what a talent he was. It is always impossible to say what a driver can become but he looked so fast with raw natural speed. Manor have alot too answer for though that car has such bad downforce that it practically dangerous for there drivers safety in the WET. RIPJules.

    1. I think it’s more appropriate to say that the FIA and Suzuka race officials have a lot to answer for.

      1. @1988ra168e I think you should read more articles that appear on this very site.

        1. Paul (@porkncheese)
          18th July 2015, 22:46

          Im new here but i tend to agree. The saftey car should definetly have been deployed

    2. Driver error, a huge reminder for everyone on the grid what yellow flags means. Marussia, FIA, Suzuka are absolutely not to blame.

      1. this is true and not true…. the drivers are told to slow down, but all all slow down “only enough” – it is a bad culture amongst drivers which can be stopped with different rules. the FIA will now probably change the rules, they already are trying with virtual safetly – but that is an epic fail, as drivers are still driving at full speed to keep tire temperature and only slowing to achieve the delta time. the FIA needs to implement a constant speed like in WEC for yellow flags, a pit limiter needs to be applied for the whole lap.

    3. It was an unfortunate culmination of unfavourable factors: standing water causing aquaplaning, a recovery vehicle in the firing line and dying daylight. If only the VSC had been brought in sooner, we wouldn’t be discussing this.

      1. yes we would. under VSC you can still drive full speed in many turns, you just have to achieve a delta time in sectors, so you can drive 90% of the sector at full throttle , and faster then you would under yellow flags past a recovery of a crash, and the last 10% of the sector you can slow to a crawl just to fall in the time frame, i noticed a lot of drivers doing that in Siliverstone – probably to keep tire temperature, it is a stupid, stupid system, much better would be to make the cars drive around at pit-limiter speed, but F1 is so stupid in this era, they can not work out anything. in Silverstone when the car was off track and the workers getting it out of the way, you could still see the race drivers taking that section of the track way too fast for comfort – basically at race speed – so what if they achieve their delta sector times if they were going way too fast where the crash was?

  3. A very talented driver, his bright future cut short by fate. May God comfort his family, and may he also protect our drivers, who always risk their lives when they enter a cockpit. Life is too fragile.

  4. He was racing…..racing in the rain. He wouldn’t slow down. He was racing. Pretty much says it all. We should all be so lucky as to go out doing what we love. RIP

    I wish I had paid more attention to him while alive. He sure was loved by so many rivals. A credit to his grieving family. Super loss to the F1 community.

    1. Well, he could have slowed down for the flags.
      Rip, Jules, we’ll Miss you.

      1. he did, sadly not enough.. but what is enough? as Brundle points out many times the drivers are afraid to lift/brake to much in that spray because they can get rammed by someone who has not. Though if the safety car had been deployed like it had (sometimes anyway) under similar situations none of it would of happened.

        Sadly again id been making a prediction of a car hitting a truck or marshals for about 10 years as the standard of race control/Marshalling at times is lacklustre (for a number of reasons, none being the volunteers effort or commitment id like to add). Its easy for somethings to be swept under the carpet as freak incidents. This wasn’t a freak, it was quite predictable and frankly amazing it hadn’t happened sooner and even with this tragic loss some haven’t appreciated this, and motorcycle racing is equally as poor… a similar incident will happen there too (see Marquez & crutchlow silverstone practice 2013) as proof of this.

        His family, friends, his team and everyone involved in the sport right down to us fans have lost an incredible driver.

        It can be a satisfying sport, but it can also be terribly cruel. I hope F1 goes into the next round with its head held up high and gives us the sort of show Jules would of wanted to be involved in

  5. Terrible loss.
    A hug to Jules’ family.

  6. Great article. I would add a paragraph about his diverse test driving activities that culminated in the Young Drivers Test in 2012 in Magny-Cours, where he drove for Ferrari in the opening and final day, and hopped into the Force India on day 2, taking P1 on all three occasions.
    This goes to show how coveted he was even before his F1 career had begun.

  7. My prayers are with his family, may he rest im peace. At least he is no longer suffering.

  8. very nice article, i am glad it did not go into “potential future champion” talks at the end like other f1 websites are doing, lets respect him for what he did, and think of him like that, the fantasies are no good to anyone in a time of loss, it just makes it harder and serves no purpose but to ramp up media sales.

  9. A sad day. Rip Jules

  10. I honestly find it hard to accept the fact I’ve just read a driver’s obituary on F1Fanatic in 2015.

    All those crashes, all those times we all held our breath, terrified to consider we may have just witnessed a fatal accident only to see the drivers climb out of the car uninjured or make a full recovery afterwards. I’m as old as Jules was and I’ve been watching F1 almost all my life, yet I’ve never had to be confronted with a driver fatality before. It’s going to take some time to fully sink in.

    On a personal selfish note, I’ll always remember that Monaco points finish as I was reporting on the race for this very site at the time. I remember how great it felt writing the article about Bianchi and Marussia’s reaction to their fantastic result because of what a celebration it was. It was such a joyful story and one that every single fan and reader of this site had the same excited and thrilled reaction to and it was one of those moments that reminded me how much I love this sport and how I wanted to remain involved with it even if it’s just to write about it on weekends.

    I never got to see Jules Bianchi race, but I was fortunate enough to be there at Silverstone for the mid-season test last year in which Bianchi was driving the Ferrari. I didn’t realise it at the time, but I was there to witness the last ever time Bianchi drove a Ferrari F1 car. I’ll always treasure that.

    I pay my deep respects to the Bianchi family and will also remember Graham Beveridge, Paolo Gizlimbherti, Maria de Villota, Ayrton Senna, Roland Ratzenberger and everyone else who has lost their life or a loved one because of this incredible and sometimes appalling sport of ours.

    1. Fikri Harish (@)
      18th July 2015, 15:58

      It pains me to say this but the first half of this decade has been pretty alarming in terms of serious accidents in motorsport.
      Wheldon’s, Simoncelli’s and Simonsen’s were fatal. Kubica’s lucky he could still race, Franchitti probably isn’t going to continue racing anymore. Just a couple months back, Hinchcliffe was in a serious one as well, though thankfully he’s expected to make a full recovery. And those were just the high-profile ones.
      Then you have NASCAR’s Jason Leffler. There was also another fatal accident in a recent Macau GP as well but their name escapes me.
      Those are not counting non-driver deaths such as the marshall from the Canadian GP and the spectator from the VLN race in the Nurburgring where Mardenborough was involved.

      I hate to be the one bringing up those bad memories but Bianchi’s isn’t an isolated incident. Obama said in his speech after Charleston, “I’ve had to make statements like this too many times”.
      Yes, I understand that it is in motorsport’s nature to be dangerous and mass shootings and motorsport’s accidents aren’t comparable in the least bit but the first thing I feel after Suzuka and waking up this morning, reading the news is, not again.

      1. Yep, can’t agree more, @fihar.

        And yet, there’s still some cynical who claims that the sport needs to be more dangerous, that tracks needs to be lees safe with less runoff areas. All of this in the name of “entertainment and excitement to the masses” of those so called F1 fans.

        In the post about Tilke’s tracks there’s a lot these kind of reasoning.

        What weird times we’re living in…

    2. I’m as old as Jules was

      Yeah it’s an awful feeling seeing someone your age passing away, I was born myself just a couple of days after Jules (and Bottas incidentally). This news has really ruined my day.

    3. @willwood I undertand you mate, I ‘ve watched F1 since I was 4, and now that I’m 15, this is the saddest day I can remember from F1. I’ve witnessed terrible crashes in my life, Massa in 2009 was a big scare for me as it was one of my favorite drivers at the time. Also, it is very curious that I didn’t watch the 2014 Japan race live, but I woke with the terrible news. I had faith in his recovery earlier this year, but now I quite depressed. Also not to mention that since this crash, F1 has gone into a very, very dark cloud.

    4. Very well said, Will.

  11. I never knew he’s Lucien Bianchi’s (who his name was immortalized as 4th corner name at Zolder) nephew.

  12. RIP Jules. So sad right now.

  13. I’m struggling for words. In a way its an incredibly unfair and sad loss. On the other hand it’s finally a relief for his family who probably endured the hardest 9 months of their lives.

    Forever Jules. I’ll never forget you, mate. Rest in peace.

    1. Agreed. For his family’s sake at least, I’m glad his suffering has come to an end. No parent should ever have to bury their child but then neither should any parent have to go through what they have for the last 9 months. Thoughts with the Bianchi family. RIP Jules.

  14. Sad day… At least he doesn’t suffer anymore. RIP Jules…

  15. RIP Jules. We are grateful to have seen you.

    Very sad.

  16. great nephew, to be precise. Both were died when doing what they loved most, so i hope Jules’s name will also commemorated in some circuits like his great uncle…

  17. Triste journée pour la F1.
    RIP Jules.
    Tu vas nous manquer.

  18. R.I.P Jules.

  19. In my 18 years watching this sport I’ve never seen it be touched by a driver fatality. It has truly brought home to me how each drivers death is a stain on the soul of Formula 1. May we never see a day as dark as this again.

    I hope that his family will find peace and solace however remote such things must seem to them today. RIP Jules Bianchi. Siocháin síor duit.

  20. Sad news. Unfortunately the potential for the same type of accident to happen is still there. It’s not talked about enough, a 30 -40 ton piece of machinery shouldn’t be on the track at the same time as a fast fragile racing car.

    1. To add – if that machinery is needed, deploy a blasted safety car.

  21. Met him in Montreal GP in ’13 got his autograph, but unlike all the other autographs I got that day, his was very lightly signed for some reason and keeps fading, it’s barely visible now. #JB17 July 17:(

    1. That’s spooky and sad, considering the tragic events of that day too. RIP Jules

  22. Really can’t believe he is not there anymore!! He will surely be missed. RIP Jules!

  23. For me, this is one of the saddest days in F1 – and motorport that i have followed, the other few similar sadnesses i can remember instantly are Sennas death (i was eleven, and still have my school daily journal where i wrote about his death happening) – at the time i dont think i felt real grief – it was just something i followed… then in 2001 in Spa there was that dreadful crash of the Prost driver i cannot remember the name of, but i remember seeing the replay of the crash and feeling so dead inside… i could not believe the driver survived when they anounced he was ok. Then came Zanardis crash where he lost his legs….. and then Simoncellis death in MotopGP. Robert Kubica’s crash (my favourite driver), shocked me to the core, i was online non stop so worried he might die or have his arm amputated. Dan Wheldons death also hit me quite hard… i feel guilty for not feeling too bad about Bianchis crash when it happened… i didnt think it was as bad as it was at the start… then the feelings started to come on slower when we heard he was unconsious. today is a day of sadness… i hope the family of Bianchi can grieve and then find positives to go forward- the biggest positive for them to see is the human that was – Jules Bianchi.

  24. I remember that I just started following Simoncelli, and a couple of races after, he was dead. Our family was shocked, and we could hardly speak about racing for some time.
    Now I have the same feeling. I am 25 years old, and I cannot imagine what my parents would do if I died tomorrow. This is crazy.

  25. I’ve watched F1 for 11 years since I was 5. I never had experienced a driver fatality which I was thankful for, but to witness not only a driver passing away but such a kind young man with a great personality and a lovely smile lose his hardest battle was heartbreaking. Rest In Peace Jules Bianchi, and Race In Paradise. We will miss you. :(

  26. DK (@seijakessen)
    18th July 2015, 21:40

    It’s just one of those curveballs life throws at you, but man, I can’t help but think what a waste.

    I dislike most of what constitutes modern F1, but Jules was the first time in a long time I was genuinely interested in a new driver. I thought the sky was the limit, and what he did at Monaco 2014 was the highlight of the race easily. He gave me a reason to watch F1 when my reaction was to shut off the TV due to the boredom of Mercedes.

    If nothing else, he was loved by many, and in the end, love is all that matters.

    RIP.

  27. One thing about Bianchi that I almost forgot at times was that he only ended up driving for Marussia because Luiz Razia’s sponsorship money fell through. How different things could have been…

    1. @paulgilb Imagine if he got Sutil’s Force India seat for 2013! Leading first race, top 5 finish at Monaco, he would probably have been all over Di Resta and a good shout for a podium in Bahrain. After that initial buzz (like Ricciardo & Bottas in mid-2014), and two years in a poor Sauber, there would have been a lot of excitement about finally moving up to Ferrari. Or, even a direct move up in 2014.

  28. Jules’ drive at Monaco was one of the true highlights of my 21 years watching F1. Thank you so much for all the memories Jules, you will be missed, so so much. My thoughts and prayers are with your family and friends at this terrible time. The Motorsport family has lost a true shining light. RIP Jules.

  29. Why did I see someone say Manor have a lot to answer for, the way I see it, the second a recovery vehicle is on track in the wet, the safety car should be instantly deployed, as Brundle has stated so many times in commentary, would that have stopped Bianchi aquaplaning, no but it would have removed the recovery vehicle and Marshals and Sauber, he would have still aquaplaned for whatever reason, too fast or wrong tyres or both, but he would still have walked away and we would be congratulating him right now on earning that Ferrari seat

    1. whilst I agree with the FIA conclusion that he was going too fast, that is evident, he went too fast and that caused the crash, but it was poor decision making by Charlie Whiting and co. for not bringing out the SC when a recovery vehicle is out there that sadly created this situation

      1. he was going too fast, but so were teh other 20 drivers in the field, it is a culture of going too fast in yellow flag zones, because 99.9999% of the time you are still safe. unfortunantly this time Bianchi was not safe… no one is to blame, every one in the sport played by the book on the day – regarding what the rule book was of the day. F1 will learn though to not make this happen again i hope, and VSC is not the answer after seeing it in Monaco and Silverstone, it seems worse then yellow flags or a real safety car… the easiest solution is to make the safety go around at 50% of the speed it is going at now, the onboards of the safety car drivers show them pushing the mercedes safety car for all it is worth… bloody hell why are they going so fast???? one day we will see a safety car crash into an f1 car stricken on the side of the road with an unconscious driver inside. F1 should learn from Nascar and Indycar, and they need to have 1 trained safety team that goes to every race, like the US sports. the US sports have there own issues in safety also, but in many respects are far ahead of F1.

    2. Forget the safety car. When there is nothing but thin air between an f1 car and a 40 ton crane there is always going to be the potential of a crash like the one Jules Bianchi had. There is no good reason why another solution for recovering vehicles cannot be found. I remember seeing a replay of the accident and just being shocked by the energy involved in the light f1 car impacting that immoveable solid lump of steel. It just strikes me as being so obvious that the crane should not have been there during a session, ever, under any circumstance.

  30. RIP to Jules Bianchi. He will be remembered.

  31. Ian Laidler (@)
    19th July 2015, 0:20

    Such a sad loss, so young and so talented …. RIP Jules.

  32. Sad, cruel and ironic how Bianchi and Sutil’s paths kept crossing. In 2013, if Force India had not decided at the 11th hour to give the seat to Sutil, Bianchi would have been in a FI car. Instead he ends up at Marussia. Jules was probably going to replace Sutil at Sauber for 2015. But instead fate intervenes in Suzuka. As they are recover Sutil’s car , Bianchi has the horrific crash into the tractor, with Sutil standing by the trackside. Twists and turns of F1

  33. Such a sad loss, to the sport and most of all his family and friends.

    I’ve been watching this sport for 29 years, so sadly have known deaths occur from it. That doesn’t make this one any easier particularly when it seems so preventable. The issue of “subconscious racing” is one that needs to be addressed. It doesn’t just afflict drivers, going as fast as they can within the parameters for their team and themselves, but also race control and race organisers. There was no single cause to this accident – going slower doesn’t necessarily prevent aquaplaning (Ericsson went off during a Safety Car period).

    – The race start time was put ahead of safety and spectator comfort. That should have been moved earlier, for the light if nothing else.
    – What the medical director was doing allowing the race to take place when it was not possible to get someone to hospital within 20 minutes as per the regulations, I don’t know.
    – Pirelli need to come up with a better full wet tyre, that drivers and teams actually want to use.
    – A multi-ton recovery vehicle should never have gone to retrieve a car from the side of the track in such conditions without a Safety Car reducing passing cars to a seriously low speed. Nor should marshals have gone out there either. There have been too many times I have winced when track vehicles and marshals were put in the firing line (Vettel at Valencia just after a Safety Car when marshals had to push his car against the flow next to a concrete wall, Kvyat’s car at Germany last year, attended to by fire crews at the end of the fastest straight on the course).
    – Whiting’s “interpretation” of how much to slow under double yellows was a staggering 0.5 of a second of the driver’s best sector time. How does that possibly help?

    I hope Jules has found some peace and his loved ones will come to terms with their loss. 25 is no age to go.

    1. Martin Brundle rambles on to no end whenever a large recovery vehicle with a chassis at head height is on track, so the FIA cannot argue the issue hadn’t been raised.

      1. i noticed Martin Brundle for about a decade or more worry about this sort of accident happening…. and it happened.

  34. RIP Jules !!!!!

    Very Sad to hear the news . The Monaco 2014 and Japanese GP of 2014 are still both so fresh in my memeory . This is the first F1 race casualty after Ayrton Senna. Such a great talent destined for greatness taken away so young !!!!!!

    The cruelest part of the fate was the 9 months of suffering he had to endure fighting for every breath of life. Even more cruel were the waves of hopes and despair his parents and the dear ones had to endure all these days which shows the crute nature of fate and the inherent risk in the sport !!!!

    RIP Jules !!!! Young will live in the hearts and minds of everyone !!!!

  35. It must have been tough writing F1Fanatic’s first obituary of a driver to die from injuries sustained from a race, but what a great job @keithcollantine, as always.

    I do hope the FIA never chooses to reallocate #17, so we can always associate it with the talented, gentle, lovely young man who was taken too soon. RIP Jules.

  36. The one thing F1 can do is learn from this, and have a serious review of sporting practice to uncover any more potentially dangerous oversights. Complacency cannot be allowed to creep in again, like it did in the early 90’s.

    The Eurosport commentary immediately prior to Ratzenberger’s crash has forever stuck with me: they were discussing the safety merits of carbon fibre construction and its energy-dissipating properties, as he was fatally injured.

    1. the strange thing is, f1 chassis are carbon fiber – one of the least energy dissipating properties, they rely on every other part of the car to dissipate energy, as carbon fiber is so rigid and does not have shock absorbtion properties. of all the safety upgrades since 1994, nothing helped in Bianchis case, maybe the gravel runoff shaved some speed off the car, but the speed was still too much, the problem was the yellow flag rules of f1, the sport has been far to leniant on the amount of speed drivers take off in yellow flag situations, and it is one of the easiest safety aspects to fix, no new chassis required and millions of dollars, JUST FORCE THE CARS TO GO SLOWER IN YELLOW FLAG

  37. Rest in Peace Jules

  38. It does not matter if it had Safety Car or not, it does not matter if he was too fast or too slow. WHY WERE THE CRANE PLACED INSIDE THE GUARD RAIL AREA? Everybody that knows a crane knows that a light vehicle like Formula 1 cars can be lifted with the crane being far away from the vehicle. IT DOES NOT NEED TO BE INSIDE THE TRACK AREA. IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN BEHIND THE GUARD RAIL, WALL, OR WHATEVER.
    How can a driver be blamed to be “fast” on a race circuit? for me it is quite clear that the procedure of removing crashed cars is wrong. Michael Schumacher had almost a very similar accident in Brazil in 2003 when the escaped on turn three and almost crashed a crane that was inside the guard rail limits. THAT IS UNACCEPTABLE. They are using the wrong crane model to lift cars. They should use the models that have long arms.

  39. Feel genuinely saddened by this news. I suppose the chances of Jules leading a “normal” life after what he suffered disappeared some time ago, but there was a flicker of hope that he might at least recover and get to spend more time with his family.

    RIP Jules – thanks for lighting up the sport as you did, you were a genuine, honest talent. You’ll be missed.

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