Gabriel Bortoleto revealed that he was "lucky" to escape his terrifying 57G airborne crash in the São Paulo Sprint without any serious injuries, as his home supporters watched on in disbelief.
In front of his family and home fans, Bortoleto crashed out in dramatic fashion on the final lap of the penultimate sprint race of the season in Interlagos.
Bortoleto was battling Alex Albon and Isack Hadjar as he approached the first corner, on what was a damp section of the Interlagos circuit.
His Stake F1 car snapped on him as he hit the brakes, pointing him in the direction of the wall on the inside of the corner.
He made heavy contact with the wall before bouncing back across the circuit, where his car went momentarily airborne as it made huge contact with the barrier on the outside of the opening corner.
A wrecked Stake finally came to rest on the run-off between the first two corners, before Bortoleto gingerly climbed out. He was sent to the medical centre for precautionary checks but was quickly back in the garage.
Remarkably, Bortoleto escaped the scary accident without any injuries, something he realised was incredibly fortunate.
"I'm lucky, because I told the doctors I stood up out of the car, and obviously I felt a little bit of pain here or there, but normal pain, like every other race weekend I've finished," Bortoleto told select media including RacingNews365.
"I always have a little bit [of pain] in the shoulder here and there, and it's a bit the same. So I'm very lucky, because I think I could have been in much worse [pain].
"But I'm able to be in one piece, talking to you [the media], almost running in qualifying, prepared myself, did everything I needed to do."
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Stake's heroic qualifying effort
Despite having just three hours to completely repair Bortoleto's car, Stake came within minutes of having it ready for qualifying.
Bortoleto had gotten into his car as the clock neared zero, highlighting just how close the Swiss outfit came to repairing the car in time.
Unfortunately, time was not on Stake's side, with Bortoleto revealing that another 20-30 minutes were required.
Asked how close Stake came to getting him out in qualifying, Bortoleto explained: "It's difficult to say, obviously, we were there, we put the car down.
"They were lacing [the seatbelts on] myself. But if you want to do things properly, they needed a bit [longer], probably 20-30 more minutes to make the car perfect for qualifying conditions.
"I think if they sent me out it was just to see if the car was actually working, because they rebuilt everything.
"So to see if the engine is running, if everything is okay or if the car is in one piece. And I think that's a bit the case."
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