The Aussie continues the Papaya Dominance!!
Oscar Piastri takes his second win this season and that too in utter dominance from start to the end.
McLaren have been the car to beat all season long and Oscar
has proved it again with taking the win, the pole and even the fastest lap. He
was in control of the race front start to end and won by a massive gap of 15.5
seconds.
On the other hand Lando only could play second fiddle to his
teammate by finishing the race in P3 under a second behind George Russell who
took the second spot on that podium.
Lando had a bad qualifying session and hence had started P6
for the race. To add on to his difficulties he got a 5 second penalty for a
false start when he rolled ahead of his pit box before even the 5 lights went
out.
Overall Lando had a very eventful race with him making
places at the start of the race and climbing to P3 but as the race went he just
seemed to lack pace to his teammate. On the second stint he got overtook by the
Ferrari of Charles Leclerc who just looked to have way more pace due to the
tire offset. But with the safety car deployed in the last 25 laps of the the
race, it brought everyone back to play, including Lando who pitted on the softs
behind the safety car and overtook Charles after multiple efforts and some
stellar attacking and defending from the pair of them. Their fight was the
highlight of the race as Charles Leclerc in a quite slower car than the Papaya
McLaren was able to defend from Lando and the placement of the car on top of
that was as close to perfection as it can be. Overall, in the end Lando caught
up to George but could not overtake him due to the lack of laps left and not
having either a huge tire offset or a massive pace advantage.
In the end a huge points haul for McLaren as team, extending
their lead even further to 58 points over Mercedes.
The race was quite eventful with overtakes all over the
field. The one that the fans enjoyed the most was Kimi Antonelli
overtaking Max Verstappen. Kimi showed everyone with his textbook overtakes
that why was he chosen as Lewis Hamilton's replacement and why is he the top
rookie this season.
Mercedes as a whole had a very mixed result with George
Russell on the podium again for the 3rd time this season alone in a car which
has sometimes looked to be lacking the pace of the front runners. But this was
not the case in Bahrain with them clearing having the second fast car out of
the lot which was certainly close to McLaren in terms of pace over one lap.
George Russell extracted the most out of his car again with him qualifying P2
only to be handed a one place grid penalty which he made up for in the race
with a good start and a brilliant race pace.
George Russell has been flying under the radar since the
start of the season but his performances truly make him one of the best if not
the best driver this season as he has consistently been near or one the podium
in all grand prixs.
On the other hand Kimi Antonelli finished outside the points
in P11, a sad end to the race for him. The Safety car did not just work out for
him as he pitted behind the safety car like everyone but just could not make up
the places back. Also, the 3 stop strategy that ended up being implemented for
him just hindered him more. None of it was his fault... he deserved to be in
the points as he had shown class and finesse in his driving style with his
overtakes.
The Ferrari boys had a better performance than they expected with them finishing in P4 and P5. The Ferrari car just seemed to be lacking the pace this race yet they pulled out a very good performance. On seeing the progress of Max, the tire strategy to pit them on the mediums again rather than the hards worked wonders for them, showing the finesse Ferrari strategy team worked with finally! This second stint on the mediums proved to be a boon for them with both the drivers progressing through the field, becoming the fastest men on the track and racking up overtakes especially the ones like Charles on Lando, Lewis on Carlos and many more. The medium tires just seems to provide optimum grip for a long period of time and yet not degrade. Hence, a well deserved performance by them. They will be happy with their performance but yet not fully satisfied as they just do not have the pace of the leading pace yet and are not able to challenge McLaren for the wins.
Red Bull seemed to have the worst car this weekend which was further aggravated with the pit stops problems they had. The Red Bull put crew had 3 pitstops around 5 seconds, something not expected by a pit crew of their caliber who are known to be constantly doing 2 second pitstops. Max Verstappen suffered the most with overheating issues and the brake feel not being the way he wants, hindering him even more. In the end he finished P6, just overtaking Pierre Gasly on the line. On the other hand, Yuki Tsunoda managed to be the first driver except Max to rake up points for the Red Bull team by finishing in P9, a much much better result than last week in Suzuka. Overall, a sad weekend for Red Bull with them just not being fast enough and not having the pace even of a Ferrari.
HAAS WERE JUST PHENOMENAL... if anyone were to be asked before the race whether Haas would perform, they would just deny... but Haas again this season has proved everyone wrong with them finishing P8 and P10 after starting P14 and P20. Esteban Ocon just drove brilliantly with him making up for them crash in qualifying by gaining 6 places in the end to end up in P8. Ollie Bearman is hands down currently one of the best rookies on the grid with him proving this time and time again. He did so do this in this race also with him finishing in P10 after starting at the back of the grid. Just a sublime drive.
The other talk of the paddock was the Alpine team. Jack Doohan had managed to qualify P11, his highest start of the season. Likewise, Pierre Gasly blew everyone's mind by qualifying P5 and starting P4 due Antonelli's penalty. The car that has looked slowed all season somehow managed to match the pace of the Red Bull this race. Pierre Gasly finished the race in P7, just to be overtook by Max on the final lap of the race. His race craft and raw pace this race was just sublime.
The VCaRb cars, the Aston Martin and Sauber just could not match the pace of the point scoring cars and just seemed to lack the pace, resulting in them being nowhere near the points. The Williams team was just unfortunate with the Safety car not acting in their favor. Also, Carlos had to retire in the race due to extensive sidepod damaged caused due to contact with Yuki in the race.
In the end Bahrain produced a stunning race as always, with a multitude of overtakes and different strategies which kept the viewers on the edge of their seat throughout the race. Bahrain again did not disappoint and produced one of the better races of the season like it has been doing so since 2004.
The major takeaways beings the outright pace of McLaren and their continuance in dominance. But the thing everyone learnt the most is that the Mercedes team seem to be catching up to McLaren, with Ferrari a little bit behind. Also, Red Bull just seem to be going backwards and being highly inconsistent resulting in them not fighting at the top of the field with Max like the past few years.
This coming week, we head to the Jeddah Corniche circuit in Saudi Arabia, a tight and twisty circuit with high speed corners which is known to produce sublime races under the lights like the one in 2021.
So, the F1 paddock heads to Jeddah, where everyone will be on the lookout for whether Mercedes or even one of the Ferrari's will be able to snatch pole and/or event the win from the utterly dominant McLaren or whether either of the two Papaya driver will continue to annihilate the competition.
Only time will tell.....
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