Leimer’s crash and in the pits at McLaren – fans’ videos from Spa

F1 video

1st September 2011, 14:3020th April 2024, 22:54 | Written by Keith Collantine

Jenson Button, McLaren, Spa-Francorchamps, 2011

There’s so much going on at a Grand Prix weekend that the televisions cameras are never going to be able to capture all of it.

F1 fans are better equipped than ever to capture footage from race weekends and their videos can give a better sense of what it’s like to see a race first-hand than the television broadcasts do.

Here is some of the best amateur footage from the Belgian Grand Prix weekend.

Practice three at McLaren

One lucky fan captured this film inside the McLaren garage as Jenson Button headed out to join in the Saturday practice session:

Getting close

Out on the track, this F1 fan got almost as close to the cars. “Sometimes bronze is better than a gold ticket,” he said:

Off-throttle audio

More footage from practice, the audio on this clip shows off the off-throttle blowing on the cars very clearly:

Qualifying at Eau Rouge

Drivers tackle a damp Eau Rouge at the start of qualifying in this high-quality clip:

Fabio Leimer’s GP2 crash

The rear wheels came off Leimer's car in a huge impact

Fabio Leimer crashed hard coming out of Eau Rouge and Raidillon during the GP2 sprint race on Saturday morning.

The enormous shunt was missed by the television cameras, but the scale of the impact is made clear in this video. You can even see the rear wheel assembly come off the back of the car in one piece.

Leimer, thankfully, was unhurt. Here’s what happened:

Drivers’ parade

A proper, old-fashioned drivers’ parade with vintage cars – that’s what we like to see:

Start grid

High quality footage of the start, with Mark Webber struggling to get away and a smoky Nico Rosberg getting off to a flier.

Lap 1 La Source

It all goes a bit wrong at La Source as Bruno Senna harpoons Jaime Alguersuari and nearly takes Fernando Alonso out too.

Lap 1 Eau Rouge

Up to Eau Rouge, where Senna takes to the run-off with his front wing missing.

Were you at Spa, and shot some videos of your own? Share them in the comments below.

If you’re going to any of this year’s remaining races you can find other fans who are here:

2011 Belgian Grand Prix

Browse all 2011 Belgian Grand Prix articles

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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35 comments on “Leimer’s crash and in the pits at McLaren – fans’ videos from Spa”

Mike
1st September 2011, 14:46

Those videos at Eau Rouge are amazing!
1. Jonathan
  2nd September 2011, 18:18
  
  Great camera angles… the TV cameras never get Eau Rouge right.
cmckinleyf1
1st September 2011, 14:48

Kovalainen and Barrichello race to the line for 15th, 0.038 in it (Not my video btw)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lgwOobQKAc
1. Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
  1st September 2011, 14:58
  
  Very nice!
Gold Leaf
1st September 2011, 14:55

A veritable one-stop shop for Bernie and his FOM flying monkeys.
Watch ’em while you can I guess.
mrgrieves (@mrgrieves)
1st September 2011, 15:06

Amazing video’s guys a joy to watch
Well done!
snowman
1st September 2011, 15:58

Ya, FOM are a disaster! There was classic on-board footage of Schumacher’s start and first 2 laps with him doing a fake then double pass on the virgins but they seem to have deleted all the you tube videos and aren’t showing it themselves anywhere. Great way of promoting the sport.
1. PJ
  1st September 2011, 17:28
  
  It better be in the race edit, the double on the Virgins especially.
BasCB (@bascb)
1st September 2011, 16:01

Great videos there Keith, thank you and a big thanks to everyone sharing their wonderfull Spa moments like this!
snowman
1st September 2011, 16:06

Great videos, clip of Leimer sitting their after big crash with the cars driving by so close bit on the unnerving side!
Mads (@mads)
1st September 2011, 16:25

Wow this is great Keith and everyone who filmed and posted these clips on youtube of cause!
Will these wrap-ups, collections, articles whatever i can call this come up after each race weekend from now on?
1. Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
  1st September 2011, 16:31
  
  That depends on what’s available!
2. AlbertC (@albertc)
  1st September 2011, 20:54
  
  +1
  
  I’d love having these kind of posts after race weekends in the future!
  1. Bleeps_and_Tweaks (@bleeps_and_tweaks)
    1st September 2011, 23:14
    
    Yeah a round up of the best quality ‘Fans Footage’ would be awesome. The videos from Eau Rouge seem to give a far better representation of the true presence of the corner compared to the official footage.
    
    The Leimer crash is pretty scary though, the speed of the impact is horrendous. It really puts into perspective how incredible the safety engineering is with top end single seaters these days.
Magnificent Geoffrey (@magnificent-geoffrey)
1st September 2011, 16:36

That video of the start from La Source really illustrates what a brilliant job the marshals do to help clear away debris after an incident.

It’s just the same at Melbourne. I’ve been lucky enough to sit in the Turn 1 grandstands for the past few years and after every start the marshals all rush onto the track to clear away all the debris after the inevitable first-corner shunt. I remember they got a big cheer in 2008 and 2009. I hope they get to keep the bits of bodywork they pick up, they deserve some souvenirs.
1. adaptalis (@adaptalis)
  1st September 2011, 16:45
  
  As far as i know, everything needs to be returned to the Scrutineers. Maybe the smallest bits can be secretly stashed.
2. Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
  1st September 2011, 22:35
  
  I meant to mention that in the copy but forgot – I’m glad you did. They’re terrific, can’t praise them enough.
3. xxiinophobia (@xxiinophobia)
  2nd September 2011, 0:10
  
  I thought it was brilliant that the crowd started cheering the marshals once the track was cleared. :) Unsung heroes of racing, they are.
4. Scalextric (@scalextric)
  2nd September 2011, 21:34
  
  Was fine work. But I thought I saw some debris on the way down to Eau Rouge in that clip that was being ignored. Maybe that’s part of what Button and Schumacher hit on lap 2.
TommyB (@tommyb89)
1st September 2011, 16:43

Great footage. When we were at Silverstone a piece of debris was right on the racing line, with drivers narrowly avoiding it as they went passed.

I was really surprised to see when we got back that it wasn’t shown during the race coverage at all.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUkGpdpNi4I
Fixy (@)
1st September 2011, 17:24

My God, Leimer’s crash was enormous. Seeing it on TV made it imaginable, but seeing it is completely different. In comparison Coletti’s crash, where he was injured, looks weaker (although that was missed as well, so it could be harder than it seemed).
1. PJ
  1st September 2011, 17:30
  
  I’m more surprised that he didn’t get tagged by another car when he came to a halt.
2. Keith Collantine (@keithcollantine)
  1st September 2011, 17:47
  
  Coletti’s was similar to the Coulthard/Schumacher collision in 1998, though it looks like the closing speed was much higher.
King Six
1st September 2011, 18:18

I always love watching trackside ‘amateur’ videos of motorsports, the really do capture the sound a million times better than the professionals. It sounds much more authentic than watching F1 on TV.

The overused pan camera angles and noisy commentators really do spoil alot of Formula One.

Plus the videos don’t get greedy claims of copyright from FOM when they’re on youtube.
1. mags (@mags)
  1st September 2011, 19:47
  
  I’m with you on this – these are better than what we get on TV! Who needs the BBC next year – we just send 20 F1 fans with good mobiles to every race – can I put my name down for Canada or Brazil?
  1. mateuss (@mateuss)
    1st September 2011, 21:23
    
    Especially as livestreaming from mobiles becomes more and more popular, joking aside, it could actually be soon(or not that soon) that we could have a few fan sourced streams running parallel to the TV stream, driver tracker and live timing. Especially for people who have two or multiple monitors available. (I only have one big widescreen, but for the F1 weekends I plug in my sisters monitor:P)
2. SimBri
  1st September 2011, 21:50
  
  You’re right King Six, the cameras always panning makes it too smooth and takes away a lot of the impression of speed I think. There are some exceptions – one of the cameras at Eau Rouge was awesome (offboard shot of the Webber pass on Alonso), as was one right on the wall to the end of the lap at Valencia (the only good thing about that circuit).
  
  Bit OT but I actually thought the TV direction was pretty good this weekend for once. I didn’t feel like we missed too much and it wasn’t just following the leader for ages when other things were happening.
  1. Jonathan
    2nd September 2011, 18:20
    
    The TV directors just don’t understand how panning ruins everything… every circuit should have at least one camera that actually shows you how fast the cars are going!
racelitze (@racelitze)
1st September 2011, 18:51

great videos:)The one with the start is my favorite –
I really dont like to see starts filmed from the front as it is usually shown on TV. side or helicopter shots are so much better
1. AlbertC (@albertc)
  1st September 2011, 21:07
  
  That’s actually true, I never really thought about it before. I always get a totally new perception of the start when they do the replay from the helicopter, I guess the lack of perception of depth hides a huge amount of mid-field battles at that point.
  
  Viewing it from behind obviously gives you a lot of more “dynamics” of the start too, however the front row battle is then missed.
lubhz (@lubhz)
1st September 2011, 19:41

Now I can have a proper view of how steep is Eau Rouge! Thanks.
GeeMac (@geemac)
1st September 2011, 20:48

Where exactly are those bronze tickets on the track, that looks mega!
Liquid
2nd September 2011, 6:28

This has to be the most amazing post ever! Thank you keith for putting this together!
bosyber (@bosyber)
2nd September 2011, 9:52

Really good post, and great bits of amateur video; That Eau Rouge positioning really shows the elevation changes much better than the shot from below used by the TV camera’s.

It’s great to have these extra ways to see the weekend, even if FOM wouldn’t miss a thing (but they will, fans are all over the track, FOM has a limited amount of camera’s), these videos each give a much better impression of the experience of being at the actual track. Great stuff.
Dan
6th September 2011, 2:07

Just commenting to say fantastic videos here, would love to see this be a regular round up!