Alonso suffers concussions, escapes serious injuries in heavy crash during pre-season test

McLaren driver Fernando Alonso has suffered only concussions and reportedly escaped serious injuries from a heavy crush during pre-season testing at the Circuit de Barcelona.

Alonso hit the wall on the exit of the 150 miles-per-hour Turn Three at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, which is one of Formula One's most demanding corners.

McLaren said that the results of hospital scans showed the driver was concussed but otherwise uninjured. The team boss, Eric Boullier, said that the Spaniard would stay in hospital overnight as a precaution, the BBC reported.

Boullier also said that Alonso's accident was just one of those things that happens in testing, adding that the two-time champion is fortunately fine, but admitted that he was concussed during the accident, which therefore required an overnight stay.

Alonso's crash happened on Sunday, shortly before the lunch break on the final day of the second of three pre-season tests. He was airlifted to hospital where CT and MRI scans were carried out.

McLaren, who have given no information on what caused the accident, said that Alonso left the track at Turn Three, causing the right-hand side of his car to strike the wall on the inside of the circuit.

It is yet unclear whether Alonso made a mistake or something broke on the car.

Alonso's teammate Jenson Button had been scheduled to take the car over for the afternoon session, but the team decided not to run again.

Boullier said that while the car wasn't particularly badly damaged, it was enough of an impact to warrant quite a lengthy check of the gearbox and power unit systems.

Boullier added that given the time needed to carry out such an analysis, they decided to bring the curtain down on their test a few hours earlier than anticipated.

Sebastian Vettel, who replaced Alonso at Ferrari when the Spaniard rejoined McLaren, was right behind him at the time of the crash. He said that the speed was slow, maybe 150 kilometers-per-hour, adding that then Alonso turned right into the wall, insisting that it looked strange.