Max Verstappen Continues Doing Max Verstappen Things At F1 Bahrain GP

Max Verstappen’s quest for a fourth successive Formula 1 world title began in emphatic fashion on Saturday night as he pulverised the opposition at the Bahrain Grand Prix. Autoweek rounds up the key talking points.

Victorious Verstappen, Again

Grab the script from F1 2023, and CTRL+C, CTRL+V it.

This was relentless brutality from Verstappen as any feint hopes rivals may have harboured about a closer title fight were well and truly extinguished before the season opener had even reached its halfway mark. At times Verstappen lapped 0.8-1.0 seconds faster than the chasing pack, guiding the RB20 around the floodlit Sakhir Circuit with ease, as he opened the year with a Grand Chelem: pole position, fastest lap, all 57 laps led, and the race victory.

It was Verstappen’s eighth triumph in a row, after he rounded off 2023 with seven successive wins.

It raises the prospect of another season of crushing dominance. Last year Verstappen won 19 from 22, surpassing his previous record of 15 in 2022, and there is every chance that tally could be immediately beaten given 2024’s extended 24-round season. The supremacy of Verstappen and Red Bull, and in being bold with the design of the RB20, has to be applauded, but the display in Bahrain was bad news for a championship that desperately needs an injection of excitement and uncertainty up front.

“I just think that today, everything just worked really, really well,” said Verstappen, understating the situation. “And I of course don't expect that to happen every single Grand Prix in the near future. So still, we take it, we look back at it, of course, we analyse it, and we'll try to improve further.”

Teammate Sergio Perez rose from fifth to second to complete a Red Bull 1-2, giving the team a perfect start, but boss Christian Horner was quick to be caution.

“I’ve been in this business too long to draw too many conclusions from a single race,” he said. “It’s a fantastic start, we’ll enjoy this moment, maximum points score. But it’s a long season, many different venues, different challenges, different conditions. And what we saw in the testing is that things are closer. Now we got it right this weekend, we took the right cars into the race, we executed a perfect race with both cars and we got a great finish. But I think that it will converge.”

But Mercedes boss Toto Wolff summed up the situation by declaring that “I think today Max is not in a different league but he’s in a different galaxy, the performance is extraordinary.”

Battling Sainz Provides a Reminder

Carlos Sainz has been something of the forgotten man already in 2024, amid the news of his replacement for 2025 at Ferrari by Lewis Hamilton. Sainz reminded prospective employers of his quality with a stirring drive in Bahrain, recovering from a slightly slow getaway to rise from fifth to third, working past George Russell and Ferrari team-mate Charles Leclerc, a move he twice had to complete owing to their pit stop strategies

“I think it's just important to start the season well, start the season with a strong race, just not for my future, just for myself, you know, because last year I spent a lot of the races, you know, looking in my mirror, saving tyres, defending my position,” said Sainz. “And I remember at the car launch saying, yeah, this year I wish we had a car to go racing, you know, and attack people and don't care too much about the tires and make some overtaking moves and look forward rather than look backwards. And it's exactly what we got. You know, I got an attacking race, a really good race pace. And from there, everything felt really good to finish P3. It was a straightforward and easy race, but yeah, I enjoyed it a lot.”

Leclerc, meanwhile, was hamstrung by a braking issue which left the car pulling to one side, causing inconsistent lap times and frustration for the driver. He nonetheless salvaged fourth – “considering everything it’s a really good effort” – but felt second was within reach without the problem. Nonetheless, he did reveal the problem had previously manifested itself during testing and a cause is as yet unknown.

Boss Fred Vasseur was cautiously optimistic.

“It’s a very long season and you have room for improvement,” said Vasseur. “Yesterday we were fighting for pole, but in the race in Bahrain the degradation is always huge for everybody and we will have other occasions to start from pole and other occasions to win races. We will keep this approach, push like hell and everybody in the team is motivated and I am quite happy with the step we did compared to 12 months ago. We will continue to push out in front.”

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