For the first time since the Australian Grand Prix in 2006, neither Ferrari Formula One car will be classified in a race. Räikkönen retired early after colliding with Williams’ Valtteri Bottas, and now Sebastian Vettel broadsided a barrier.
Sebastian Vettel had a lousy start, quickly losing his third place starting position after puncturing a tire in a collision with Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo. He pit early for a tire, costing him valuable time as the field spread out early in the race.
Vettel pushed a bit hard as he tried to make up places, spinning out in the process. He rejoined at even further back in the field, which led him to a series of humiliating blue flags he didn’t want to follow. Vettel argued over the radio that he was on pace, but he was being lapped by the leaders—hence the flags instructing him to let the leaders through.
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3by3zd
Finally, the last Ferrari in the race spun.
Even if you’re not a fan of Vettel’s, or you think he was a bit stubborn when refusing to follow the blue flags earlier, you had to feel a little sorry for the guy as he attempted to pick up some of the debris from his own wreck and put it neatly inside the car.
This, folks, is the face of despair.
Ferrari wrote it off with an overused “haha, we work with cars and our office is a race track” reference on their Twitter account:
...but it was WTF1 who nailed it better:
Sauber’s Felipe Nasr then brought out another yellow flag due to a brake fire, so the attrition predicted before the race came true somewhat. Ferrari, however, describes Vettel’s race-ending crash as a “mistake.”
[Correction: Somehow Massa got named instead of Nasr for the brake fire, despite the fact that it was clearly a blue and yellow car with smoking brakes. This has since been fixed.]
Contact the author at stef.schrader@jalopnik.com.