Lewis Hamilton suffers final practice crash amid F1 'nightmare'

Lewis Hamilton has suffered a crash in final practice at the F1 season-ending Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.

Seven-time world champion Hamilton was on a flying lap on soft tyres half way through FP3 when he lost control of his Ferrari and spun off into the barriers at Turn 9.

Hamilton was unhurt in the incident, which resulted in final practice being red-flagged. 

"Something buckled at the front and snapped the rear," Hamilton reported over team radio. 

Analysing the incident, Hamilton's former F1 title rival Nico Rosberg said: "It's just rough. But I have to say that he was really going well until that point in time.

"It starts on the entry already. It starts with bottoming as he was turning in that already loosened up the rear, and then it had a follow-on effect."

It has been a wretched first season with Ferrari for Hamilton, who is facing his first campaign in F1 without claiming a Grand Prix podium. 

"It's a nightmare and he cannot wait to get out of this car," Rosberg added. "He has hope that next year's car can bring him back in a way."

Hamilton is the most successful driver in Abu Dhabi with five wins.

Hamilton's crash analysed

"As far as I can see, there's nothing that's buckling on the right, everything looks ok," Sky Sports F1 pundit Anthony Davidson said. 

"Of course, when it goes into the wall, the damage is done to the right front and they're not going to be able to tell now. Their post-session investigation is going to be a lot more difficult now because it's all destroyed on the right front.

"The sparks start when he's on the kerbs, the one tiny spark being kicked up, which is the first tell-tell sign that he's ventured onto the kerb and lowered the car's ride-height just before turning into the corner.

"I think the combination of that, high-speed corner and the turbulence of the car in front, on top of the balance not being great as well, went against him there."