Drivers disqualified after 500-mile karting race turns to track brawl

The two drivers were disqualified from the results of the 500-mile Karting Event, after a track crash turned into a bar-brawl.

Ex-Formula One driver Felipe Massa has apologised after one of his teammates attempted to strangle his rival on the track at the 500 Milhas de Kart event in Brazil.

Rodrigo Dantas, who was driving the second kart for Massa's team, was a lap down and was holding up A1 Grand Prix racer Tuka Rocha.

After repeated contact, Rocha eventually punted Dantas to a standstill against the tyre wall, who immediately leapt from his kart ready to fight.

Dantas pinned Rocha to the ground and repeatedly punched his helmet in retaliation before the two were wrestled apart by security guards and karts of the two teams.

Massa himself issued an apology to Autosport.com saying he was saddened by his teammate's behaviour.

Felipe Massa apologised on behalf of his team. Photo / Getty

"For me, this is very sad and sadder still to see my team within that."

"It was not my decision - I was driving the [leading] kart - but I apologise to everyone for what happened, because I have never seen anything like it in my career," he said.

"The competition is inside the track, but never in this way."

The fist fight saw both drivers disqualified from the results and Massa said it was the running battle between the teams throughout the race which was the catalyst for what transpired.

"From what I saw, the whole team should be disqualified," he said of the previous encounters between them.

"But that did not happen, and what happened next was a war inside the track."