📷 SkySport
Jack Doohan was only on his fifth lap of FP2 when things went bad. He was driving super fast—over 330 kilometers per hour (about 205 miles per hour)—into Turn 1, a tricky, high-speed corner at Suzuka. As he turned the steering wheel, the back of his Alpine car suddenly slid out, spinning him off the track. He smashed hard into the tire barriers on the left side, wrecking his car. The left side was destroyed, and both the front and rear wings were torn off.
Doohan stayed in the car for a few moments, probably shocked by the hit. He climbed out with help from marshals and limped away, but he told his team over the radio, “I’m okay.” After a quick check at the medical center, doctors confirmed he was fine, just shaken up.
The big question was: what caused this crash? Alpine’s team boss, Oliver Oakes, explained it. On the lap he crashed, Doohan was flying down the straight toward Turn 1. He lightly tapped the brakes—like he did on an earlier lap—but kept pushing the gas longer than usual. Then, as he turned the wheel, the back of his Alpine slid out, and he spun into the barriers. The team said he forgot to close DRS manually, which caused the loss of grip.
📷 SpeedCafe
After Doohan’s crash, some experts looked at his data and wondered if he meant to leave DRS open. They think he might have tested this idea in a simulator and thought it could work in real life.
Real life isn’t a simulator. The sim might not fully match Suzuka’s bumpy track, the strong tailwind that day, or the exact grip of his real tires. In FP2, the wind was pushing from behind, making the car even trickier to hold steady. Plus, Doohan had less track time—he didn’t drive in FP1—so he might not have felt how the car behaved in those exact conditions.
Real life isn’t a simulator. The sim might not fully match Suzuka’s bumpy track, the strong tailwind that day, or the exact grip of his real tires. In FP2, the wind was pushing from behind, making the car even trickier to hold steady. Plus, Doohan had less track time—he didn’t drive in FP1—so he might not have felt how the car behaved in those exact conditions.
📷 GiveMeSport
Doohan didn’t say much about the sim idea after the crash. He told his team, “It was a heavy one, something that caught me by surprise, and I will learn from it.” Alpine’s boss, Oliver Oakes, called it a “DRS error,” suggesting it was a mistake, not a strategy. But Doohan hasn’t confirmed or denied trying the sim trick.