Bahrain Testing - Day 1

 The first day of the 2024 Formula One pre-season testing is behind us! For those unfamiliar with the structure, it was divided into two parts: a four-hour morning session and a four-hour afternoon session. The two were separated by an hour-long lunch break. It is important to note that while the testing can give us a lot of valuable information regarding the new cars, it is by no means a tell-all of how the season will go. The drivers' best lap times do register during the session, but seeing them on top of the leaderboard does not necessarily mean that they will stay there during the upcoming races. 

With the general introduction to the event behind us, let us focus on the morning session. For the first four hours, we could see Verstappen, Leclerc, Alonso, Piastri, Tsunoda, Russel, Bottas, Albon, Ocon, and Magnussen on the Bahrain circuit. The quickest time was achieved by none other than Max Verstappen (1:32:548), whose sight at the top of the leaderboards brings back memories from the 2023 season. He was followed by Leclerc (1:33:247) and Alonso (1:33:385). The ladder also managed the most laps out of all the drivers, finishing at 77. Most of the session was relatively calm with drivers focusing on gathering data that could be later used by their teams. The one exception was Alex Albons' unexpected stop on the track toward the end of the four hours, later explained by Williams as a 'fuel pump issue'. It caused a yellow flag to appear, but did not turn into a red one, since Albon managed to move the car from the track. Aside from his incident, we could also see Alpine's Esteban Ocon drive into the gravel and catch a glimpse of our first overtake of the season, provided by Max Verstappen and Charles Leclerc. Reminiscent of 2023, it was the RedBull overtaking the Ferrari. 

After an hour-long break, the testing resumed. Most of the teams opted for a driver swap, with Verstappen and Russel being the only ones who spent the whole day behind the wheel. Aside from them, we could watch Sainz, Stroll, Norris, Ricciardo, Hamilton, Zhou, Sargeant, Gasly, and Hulkenberg. The session, once again, ended with Verstappen in the lead (1:31:244), after putting together 142 laps. He was closely followed by Norris and Sainz. Logan Sargeant undoubtedly gave Williams a bit of a scare when, a little more than two hours into the session, he spun off into the gravel. Thankfully, after spending some time in the pit, he was able to resume racing. Other things to note were various wheel lockups (for example for Ricciardo) and a wing mirror falling from Stroll's Aston Martin. While the cars put in the hours on track, Alex Albon, having already finished his driving for the day, commented on Williams' predicted performance and mentioned that the team made some 'balanced trade-offs' to become more competitive in the upcoming season. 

Overall, while the first day may not have brought a lot of excitement, it did provide us with some useful information regarding the 2024 cars. Williams seemed to struggle with reliability, losing a lot of track time, both in the morning and afternoon sessions. To no surprise to anyone watching the 2023 season, Verstappen topped the leaderboards. Even with the track times not being that telling, especially on the first day, one can only imagine how scared the other teams must be. Now the only thing left is to wait for what tomorrow might bring.