Yahoo Autos How Ferrari, Haas emerged as F1 Bahrain GP stars
Ferrari scores its first win since 2019.
Defending F1 champion Max Verstappen starts his season with a DNF.
In his return for Haas, Kevin Magnussen grabs a surprise fifth place finish.
Formula 1’s new era kicked off on Sunday night in Bahrain with a Ferrari 1-2, a disaster for the reigning champion, and joyous redemption for Haas. Autoweek breaks down Sunday’s opener.
Ferrari back on top
It has been a chastening couple of seasons for Ferrari.
It plunged to sixth overall in 2020, amid power unit setbacks, and while 2021 was a rebuilding year it went winless for a second straight season.
But Charles Leclerc backed up his pole position with victory in the desert, the third of his career, after prevailing in an enthralling battle against champion Max Verstappen.
Three times Verstappen used straight-line speed to pluck the lead from Leclerc into Turn 1 but on each occasion the Ferrari driver kept a cool head to immediately fight back.
After Verstappen’s third and final attempt a composed Leclerc built an advantage that he never relinquished, and Ferrari’s super start to 2022 was backed up by Carlos Sainz moving into second place late in the going.
With Leclerc taking fastest lap it gave Ferrari the maximum possible haul of 44 points. The F1-75 has pace, its drivers have confidence, and the team looks sharp.
“A victory is always very, very special and I definitely feel much [more] grown as a driver compared to my victories in 2019,” said Leclerc. “Here today, everything felt a little bit more under control. It felt nice. Obviously, there was some very tense moments on the track with Max after the first stop, after the Safety Car restart after that, but everything was managed well and I could bring the victory home.”
Leclerc’s victory came three years after he dominated proceedings at the same venue only for a lost cylinder to drop him to third. And he even had enough assurance to play a little prank on Ferrari.
“I did a bit of a joke on the radio on the last lap saying there was something strange with the engine,” he said. “And the engineers I’m pretty sure didn’t like that!”
A disaster for the reigning champion
Verstappen and Leclerc used to be rivals in karting and at long last both have machinery to battle for the leading positions in Formula 1.
Sunday’s scrap was a tantalizing taste at what could unravel across the remainder of the season – but for Verstappen it was his own race that ultimately unravelled.
Verstappen suffered from overheating brakes, then developed steering issues midway through the race, suspected to be from a bent track rod when Red Bull dropped the car at his final pit stop.
That left Verstappen struggling for pace, but that issue paled in comparison to a suspected fuel system issue that slowed his car in the closing stages.
The problem was terminal, and Verstappen was forced into retirement, kick-starting his title defense with zero points.
And it went from bad to worse for Red Bull as Sergio Perez – on course for a podium – suffered the same issue and his car crunched to a halt when the rears locked into turn 1 on the last lap.
That left Red Bull Racing with nothing to show for a race in which it had front-running potential.
“It was totally out of the blue,” said boss Christian Horner. “It’s something we haven’t seen previously. We’ll strip the cars; we’ll get into it and understand what the issue was.”
“It’s not what you want especially after positive test days and a positive weekend and it looked like until the issues we had, we would be in second place,” said Verstappen. “That would’ve been still a good result, 18 points, [with] Checo fourth, but to retire with both cars at the end of the race is very disappointing.”
“It’s a very low day for our team,” conceded Perez.
Mercedes’ salvage job
Mercedes feared prior to the race that it would struggle to compete for the win – and its expectations were realized.
Lewis Hamilton and George Russell spent most of the race fifth and sixth respectively, lapping around a second off the leading pace, before Red Bull’s late issues elevated their cars.
It gave Hamilton a surprise podium, with Russell fourth, but neither shirked at the size of the task facing the outfit.
“It was a difficult race for us today, we've struggled throughout practice and this is really the best result we could have got,” said Hamilton. “It is not going to be a quick turnaround, but we've been the best unified team for so long, we all know to just keep your head down, keep working, there's a long way to go.”
“If you’d told us we’d get P3 and P4 we’d absolutely have taken it,” said Russell. “We weren’t awfully quicker than the midfield, and that was our main concern. We saw how quick Haas were, Alfa Romeo, we’ve got a lot of work to do.”
Mercedes is still suffering more than most with the bouncing issues caused by ground effect, costing it pure performance, while it also conceded it got its set-up wrong. Mercedes boss Toto Wolff confirmed “we were over winged today” and had “too much drag” while it was also suffering from higher tire degradation than the front-runners.
Mercedes may be second in the standings in the results but in terms of performance it still has a chasm to Ferrari and Red Bull.
Haas is back
Oh, at last. At long, long last. There was jubilation down in the Haas garage as Kevin Magnussen put in a superb display to grab fifth position.
After a point-less 2021 Haas’ decision to pour its limited resources into its 2022 project has already been fully vindicated.
Magnussen showed consistent pace throughout the race and held seventh place for the most part. That became fifth thanks to Red Bull’s late drama, but it was nothing more than the team deserved.
It leaves them a giddy third in the constructors’ championship with 10 points.
“The craziness just continues,” said Magnussen. “We had a really good race and the car was good all the way through. Obviously, a bit of luck there with the two Red Bull’s but we’ll take that.”
“We knew we had a good car but you still need to deliver,” said boss Guenther Steiner. “The longest stint we did before today was 18 laps, so to do 57 was quite an achievement.”
Steiner had already spoken with owner Gene Haas and that “for sure he is happy like this, as for a small team to finish fifth is a great achievement. These small teams, we can come along and do it.”
On Haas holding third Steiner said: “Yeah! I don’t think we stay here for long… but enjoy the dream.”
F1 Bahrain Grand Prix Results
Charles Leclerc, Ferrari
Carlos Sainz Jr., Ferrari +5.5 seconds
Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes +9.6
George Russell, Mercedes +11.2
Kevin Magnussen, Haas +14.7
Valtteri Bottas, Alfa Romeo +16.1
Esteban Ocon, Alpine +19.4
Yuki Tsunoda, AphaTauri +20.3
Fernando Alonso, Alpine +22.3
Guanyu Zhou, Alfa Romeo +23.0
Mick Schumacher, Haas +32.5
Lance Stroll, Aston Martin +45.8
Alex Albon, Williams +53.9
Daniel Ricciardo, McLaren +54.9
Lando Norris, McLaren +56.3
Nicholas Latifi, Williams +1:01.7
Nico Hulkenberg, Aston Martin +1:03.8
Sergio Perez, Red Bull DNF
Max Verstappen, Red Bull DNF
Pierre Gasly, AlphaTauri DNF