Bahrain - Race

The first race of the 2024 seasons brought both surprises and things that most fans expected to see. Hearing the Dutch anthem once more might have shattered the hopes of Red Bull's dominance coming to an end, but the 57-lap race was anything but dull, surely creating tensions in multiple teams. 

Right after the lights went out, Aston Martin's Lance Stroll spun out. The accident made him lose quite a few positions but by the end of the race he managed to recover and ended up 10th, scoring some much-needed points for his team. Hulkenberg got caught in the crossfire, damaging his wing. He needed to head for the pit stop much earlier than the team would have liked which cost him the great position he was starting the race from. Bottas also didn't leave the scene unscathed, which ended up being only the first of a few problems he would face throughout the race. 

Moving closer to the front of the field, we could see Russel fighting to overtake Leclerc and jump from third to second. The British driver managed to move past the Ferrari, but he wasn't as safe as he would hope in his newly found position. A four-way fight for P2 saw Russel, Leclerc, Perez, and Sainz all trying to improve. Around lap 7 Perez managed to overtake Leclerc, leaving the two Ferraris one after another. For a while, we could see a fight remnant of 2023's Monza, which ended with Sainz moving past his teammate and into P4. 

In the meantime, around lap 10, Sargeant's Williams locked up, forcing the driver to stop by the racetrack. For a while, it looked like this would be the end of the American's first race of the year, but he managed to join the race, albeit with a huge disadvantage. It wasn't the only problem Williams faced on track. The car began overheating and the message "CAR TOO HOT" could be seen on Albon's dashboard. 

Around lap 12 began the first wave of pit stops. One by one drivers drove over to their garages, slightly shaking up the race order. The Ferraris switched once more, with Sainz ending up behind his teammate. It wasn't for long, the Monegasque struggled with the car, going off track on multiple occasions. He reported a problem with breaking and wheel lockups. Sainz passed him after a couple of laps. The good news for the Italian team was that, after they struggled with tire wear in 2023, this year, the engineers reported that tire life was longer than expected. 

Leclerc wasn't the only one facing issues in the middle portion of the race. After his big lockup, Sargeant fell behind more than a minute in comparison to other drivers. Alpine struggled to get out of the bottom five. Hamilton reported his seat breaking mid-race. Kick Sauber performed a catastrophic pit stop, forcing Bottas to wait in the pitlane for more than 50 seconds. RB, previously AlphaTauri, saw tensions between their drivers. Tsunoda didn't hide his irritation when he was asked to swap places with his teammate, just so Ricciardo could overtake Magnussen. His frustration only grew when his teammate did not manage to move past the Haas. 

In the front, Russel and Leclerc fought for P4, with the Ferrari coming on top in the end and leaving the Mercedes behind far behind. Sainz, in P3 and with a comfortable lead over his teammate, questioned Ferrari's tire strategy, noting that he had little chance of catching up to the Red Bulls since both of them bolted on soft tires while he was on hard ones. 

In the end, Verstappen won the race by more than 20 seconds. Perez and Sainz secured their first podiums of the season, ending up at P2 and P3 respectively. The Spaniard was voted 'driver of the day', thanks to his phenomenal performance. All in all, the race in Bahrain was a great preview of the season ahead. 

Order of the grid:

1. Max Verstappen

2. Sergio Perez

3. Carlos Sainz

4. Charles Leclerc

5. George Russel

6. Lando Norris

7. Lewis Hamilton

8. Oscar Piastri

9. Fernando Alonso

10. Lance Stroll

11. Zhou Guanyu

12. Kevin Magnussen

13. Daniel Ricciardo

14. Yuki Tsunoda

15. Alex Albon

16. Nico Hulkenberg

17. Esteban Ocon

18. Pierre Gasly

19. Valtteri Bottas 

20. Logan Sargeant