Watch Hamilton and Vettel send off Alonso with DONUTS

It was Fernando Alonso’s last race in Formula 1 yesterday. The two-time F1 world champion is leaving the sport for new adventures next year – perhaps achieving the Triple Crown – so yesterday was special.

He started 15th on the grid, and finished 11th, meaning he just missed out on a championship point. His race engineer asked Alonso over the radio to push for a 10th placed finished and claim his final score in F1. “I already have 1,800 points,” he replied. Well, 1,899 actually, so that single extra point would have been nice.

Anyhow, Lewis Hamilton won the last race, followed by Sebastian Vettel, and on the slow-down lap after the race ended, these two multiple world champions formed a guard of honour, flanking Alonso’s McLaren as the Spaniard made his way back to the start/finish straight.

Once there, they all indulged in a spot of donuting to please the crowd. Mercedes, McLaren and Ferrari, kicking up enough smoke to make Victorian London blush. It’s over on F1’s official YouTube channel, which you can watch by heading this way.

Fernando might be back in the future, mind, as he hinted at in interviews over the weekend…