Rallying is equally brilliant and scary. While we’ve never been behind the wheel of an actual rally car on an actual rally course at an actual rally pace, we know you need to have some outlandish skills to be a proper rally driver. Sometimes, even if you are an experienced veteran, mistakes happen, let alone if you are a rookie trying to find your place under the sun in the rally scene.

We had never heard of the young Lucas Zielinski before but it’s on our radar now. Unfortunately, for all the bad and unfortunate reasons but we’ll get to that in a second. According to data from eWRC-results.com, the 24-year-old Frenchman has three official starts this year, all on rallies in France and going fourth and seventh in the junior class during the first two races. The last race from this weekend was a disaster for Zielinski.

 

A video posted on Reddit shows Zielinski in his white Ford Fiesta R2B during the Rallye Cœur de France. The rally took place this past weekend in Savigny-sur-Braye, France, and Zielinski hit a bump almost at full speed and then flew several metres before landing with the wheels facing the sky.

We don’t know why he approached the left turn at such a high speed but there are two possible scenarios. On one hand, Zielinski probably misunderstood the instructions given by his co-driver, Mahinc Enzo. However, it seems more likely to us that there was a failure with the brake system which prevented him from stopping on time.

Fortunately, according to different reports in French media, both the driver and his co-pilot escaped the spectacular crash with only minor injuries. Lavanguardia.com even quotes M Sport’s director Malcolm Wilson stating that the company builds its race cars “strong but, more importantly, we make sure everyone is safe.”