Jos Verstappen walked away from a heavy crash at Rallye de Wallonie on Sunday after a high-speed off on the Loyers stage left his Škoda Fabia RS Rally2 upside down and his weekend over.
Verstappen, competing with stand-in co-driver Jasper Vermeulen, was running third when he clipped a tree on the dusty Belgian roads. The impact was violent enough to rip a wheel from the car before it rolled onto its roof and came to rest inverted. Both men were able to climb out unaided and, crucially, unhurt.
It’s the sort of incident that looks far worse on video than it feels in the moment — until you stop moving and realise you’re staring at the roof lining. Verstappen didn’t sugar-coat it afterwards, describing it as a “huge impact” and admitting the limit had been misjudged in tricky conditions.
“It was a right-hand bend that I had to take in fourth gear. It was dusty, there was gravel on the surface,” Verstappen said in comments carried on the Belgian Rally Championship’s Instagram channel. “I think I went into the corner a bit too fast, and at the end of the corner, the car broke away. Then we hit a post.
“The post whipped the car around, and then we landed on the roof.”
For all the talk around Verstappen’s rallying renaissance in recent seasons, the crash was also a reminder of why modern Rally2 machinery earns its reputation the hard way. Impacts that would have been career-defining in previous eras are now, more often than they should be, survivable — provided the crew are strapped into a properly prepared car.
“The most important thing is that Jasper and I came out of the car safely,” Verstappen added. “It was a huge impact. But we sit in such safe cars, that shows again. I’m glad we came out of it well.”
Verstappen’s entry in Wallonie came with a small reshuffle on the right-hand seat. Vermeulen stepped in because Verstappen’s usual co-driver, Renaud Jamoul, is sidelined while recovering from surgery on an ankle injury. Any thoughts of turning the weekend into a points-collecting exercise ended the moment the Fabia cartwheeled, forcing a retirement on the spot.
That Verstappen was even in the fight for a podium before the crash speaks to the level he’s reached away from grand prix racing. He’s been a regular presence in rallying lately and arrived this weekend as the reigning Belgian Rally Champion, not a celebrity guest.
Sunday, though, belonged less to the stopwatch and more to perspective. The rally was done, the car was wrecked, but the crew walked away — and in motorsport, that’s still the only line that matters.
