Max Verstappen has started his title defence with a dominant victory in the season opening Bahrain Grand Prix. The three-time champion drove another smooth race making it look easy as he beat his Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez by twenty-two seconds as he took a clean sweep this weekend.
Verstappen made a brilliant start as he fended off Charles Leclerc into the first corner, from then on it looked easy once again for the Dutchman. He steadily opened the gap from the off another leaf out of the Verstappen textbox as he sailed off into the distance. Perez had started the race in fifth but early on he picked his way past Carlos Sainz and George Russell.
Verstappen went into the race as a strong favourite, after winning a closer-than-expected battle for pole position with Leclerc. The three-time champion suffered a little wheelspin in the second phase of his start, which allowed the Ferrari driver to challenge on the outside at the first corner. Verstappen led the entire race and claimed an extra point for setting the fastest lap as he beat Perez, who delivered a strong drive from fifth on the grid.
Leclerc’s second phase of the start saw him drop behind Russell early on, before he past the Mercedes in the closing laps to take fourth. Red Bull will be happy to hit the headlines for the right reasons, the last fortnight dominated by allegations of inappropriate behaviour from a female employee by CEO and team principal Christian Horner.
Asked by the BBC before the race whether messages apparently leaked to many media outlets and online, were genuine and replied that he “couldn’t comment on messages from an anonymous sender”.
After delivering the most dominant season in the sport’s history in 2023, Verstappen’s victory extends his winning streak from the end of last year to eight races. The dominant nature of Red Bull’s display strengthens pre-season predictions that the reigning constructors’ champions are likely to continue the sort of dominance that saw them win all but one last year.
Sainz eventually finished third, two and a half seconds behind Perez, beating his teammate Charles Leclerc by fourteen seconds after overcutting him at the first stop. The Spaniard then maintaining the edge over the Mercedes at both his stops eventually finishing seven seconds ahead of Russell.
He also passed Leclerc on either side of the first round of pit stops, Sainz then eased past Russell and from there on looked more likely to catch Perez for second than to be challenged from behind.
Leclerc’s race soon unravelled in the opening stint as a braking issue saw him regularly lock up in the big braking zones, which allowed Sainz to pass but he managed to fight back against Russell in the second stint. The Ferrari passing the Mercedes after a lock-up with ten laps to go.
Verstappen said, “Unbelievable. I think today went even better than expected. I think the car was really nice to drive on every compound. I think we had a lot of pace and it was just super enjoyable to drive today. We stayed out of trouble and it’s a great start of the year, it couldn’t have been better.”
Perez, added “I think it was the maximum we could have achieved. It was quite a tricky race with the management of the tyres, there’s plenty we will learn from tonight’s race which will be important for the championship. It was really [tyre] compound to compound the amount of sliding we were having. We were having some issues with the engine braking, the driveability, which is not easy around here.
Sainz, said “I think it was a very good race after a tricky start. I settled into my pace and knew I had good race pace from testing and settled into my rhythm. I started overtaking cars, kept it up with Checo which wasn’t easy because the Red Bulls had really good pace and a good strategy with the new soft. But, very happy and an encouraging start.”
Russell eventually being dragged into a brilliant scrap with fellow Brits, Lando Norris and teammate Lewis Hamilton for fifth to seventh. With twenty-five laps to go, Norris and Hamilton both stopped as Russell in hindsight gained track position as he stopped.
Hamilton looked quick in the first two stints, but it wasn’t until he cleared Fernando Alonso and Oscar Piastri at the second stop he was able to show what the Mercedes was able to do. All while fighting discomfort caused by a broken seat.
Piastri meanwhile jumped Alonso in the final stint, the Aston Martin driver who started sixth appeared to struggle for pace compared to Mercedes and McLaren. That allowed Hamilton and Piastri to use strategy to pass the two-time champion, but the team managed to get Lance Stroll through the second half of the grid after he made contact with Nico Hulkenberg.
The Canadian had been tapped by the Haas as the jostled into the opening corner collecting Valtteri Bottas and Logan Sargeant, as they dropped to nineteenth and twentieth, but that was the only major drama of the race. All here continued with Stroll claiming the final point as he was the last car on the lead lap.
Bottas’s teammate Guanyu Zhou was eleventh ahead of Kevin Magnussen, and Haas starting the season better than the dire predictions going into the season. Magnussen holding off the bickering RB’s, Yuki Tsunoda reluctant to give Daniel Ricciardo pass, but when he did the Australian couldn’t make any gains on the Dane.
Alex Albon was fifteenth, in a difficult race for Williams the British-Thai driver nursing his over heating car home. In addition to the opening lap incident, Sargeant had his own issues with the brakes. Albon finished ahead of Hulkenberg who was also caught in the opening lap incident.
Alpine duo Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly were cemented towards the bottom in seventeenth and eighteenth. A damaged Bottas beat Logan Sargeant to round out the field, as the American appeared to suffer from a braking issue that forced an off-track excursion on the tenth lap.
Related
- BAHRAIN GP – Qualifying Result
- BAHRAIN GP – Max Verstappen takes pole two tenths ahead of Charles Leclerc for season opener
- BAHRAIN GP – Carlos Sainz fastest by under a tenth and a half from Fernando Alonso in third practice
- BAHRAIN GP – Lewis Hamilton leads a Mercedes one-two by two tenths in second practice
- BAHRAIN GP – Daniel Ricciardo fastest in first practice, three hundredths ahead of the McLaren’s
- PRIXVIEW – Bahrain Grand Prix 2024
