2022 Bahrain Grand Prix - Sakhir, March 18 - 20

[zeph]

My takeaway from round 1:

Leclerc is a smart cookie, he totally baited Verstappen into locking up in turn one on lap 19, and that won him the battle.

RBR just found out that making F1 PU’s is hard.

Hamilton still on the podium in an uncompetitive car may prove to be important if Mercedes manages to fix its flaws.

[Big Tea]

So if it was underfueled by enough to give this result with a safety car, How much under weight would it have started? Maybe it is not as fast as it looks?

[F1NAC]

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RBR just found out that making F1 PU’s is hard.

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Expect, they are not building it. It's all Honda still whatever the name is. They didn't even finish the building for powertrains.

[zibby43]

We are going to have a 3-way title fight.

Gonna be epic.

So happy for Ferrari. F1 is better when they’re competitive.

In a space that feels so tribal, I am not ashamed to heap praise upon Ferrari.

[AeroDynamic]

Dont know if it was mentioned.. But the Ferrari pitstops are much better this year!
The stops gave them the win.
Both stops Max could have got rhe undercut but the quick ferrari stops countered that.

Mercedes stops are as slow as their car. 4 second stops consistently. I do wonder if they were demotivated after losing the WDC last year and didnt put in much work over the winter?

Mate the Ferrari team as a whole carried that race like Champions. I was shocked with RBR strategy, their drivers complaining about their outlap strategy is really contrasting with how great the team have been operationally recently. wtf.

We are going to have a 3-way title fight.

Gonna be epic.

So happy for Ferrari. F1 is better when they’re competitive.

In a space that feels so tribal, I am not ashamed to heap praise upon Ferrari.

would like this to be true but I cannot see it happening unless RBR sort their reliability or Ferrari have reliability issues too.

[Henri]

It was a bit like a comedy sketch when they gave Perez the order "get your elbows out" and then a moment later his car was facing the wrong way. as if a driver needs to be told to defend and they are acting like its still 2021 for the team to keep Hamilton behind.

That was classless from that redbull engineer.. i when the car stopped

[Shrieker]

It's a valid point. Max could try the straight to turn 4 with DRS. He never did today against Charles.
That lockup was not smart by Max 'divebomb' Verstappen

I'm guessing with how much better traction the Ferrari had coming out of the 2/3/4 section, Max would've gotten close at best.

Another good chance was the pit stop in/out laps, which he did lament during the race, and after. But Ferrari trumped the bulls on that front as well; one of their head to head stops for the lead was just short of a second faster than the bulls which gave Lec breathing space on his out lap vs. Max; think it was the 2nd round of stops ?

[LM10]

How wrong I was!

Ferrari not only is the fastest car but did not have any technical failure, RB, on the other hand..... what a nightmare race for them.

Nah Ferrari not the fastest car. That difference was down to Leclerc's clever driving and tyre management. If anything the cars were more or less equal in race trim. I actually expected RedBull to walk away with it but tyre issues came to be the decider today.

Let’s sum up what you’ve claimed until now, shall we?

1. Right after seeing the F1-75 in February you already started saying that you can’t see the car being a contender.

2. In the middle of pre-season-testing in Bahrain you told that (as a Mercedes fan) you’re not worried of Ferrari because they play it safe by riding their car high and even if they would have a fast car they would lose out on strategy. So you said the real opponent of Mercedes would be RedBull.

3. Today right before the race you claimed that RedBull would drive off into the sunset and win by a gap of 10 seconds.


… Now, after the race that was won by a Ferrari car which clearly had the best race pace (I don’t mean dominant by that), by flawless strategical calls and best pit stops by the Ferrari team, you keep on claiming things hoping to get it right at some point.

Of course Charles executed everything perfectly and outsmarted Max, but he had the car to do so.
For all we know the F1-75 had the best tyre deg. If you want to claim that it all was on the drivers you would need to provide evidence.

Let’s not forget that the F1-75 pretty much still is the spec of pre-season testing with a slightly modified floor to tackle porpoising and a slightly modified diffuser from last day in pre-season-testing.

It’s not so hard to accept that Ferrari have done a good job, is it?

[Shrieker]

Well, they have lacked it before. its peaceful now but how long will it last if they have to duke it out regularly.

They have a loooong history going back all the way to karting these two. Remember, Nico and Lewis were friends (as not in 'friends'), but things got real sour real quick between the two. There can be only one, after all.

I give it 5 races max (no pun intended ) before things get really heated and messy.

[zeph]

.

RBR just found out that making F1 PU’s is hard.

.

Expect, they are not building it. It's all Honda still whatever the name is. They didn't even finish the building for powertrains.

Yeah, Honda will continue to provide support for 2022, but they have one foot out the door already. You know how it is.

Anyway, we'll see if this was a one-off or indicative of deeper problems.

[101FlyingDutchman]

.

RBR just found out that making F1 PU’s is hard.

.

Expect, they are not building it. It's all Honda still whatever the name is. They didn't even finish the building for powertrains.

Yeah, Honda will continue to provide support for 2022, but they have one foot out the door already. You know how it is.

Anyway, we'll see if this was a one-off or indicative of deeper problems.

It’s not the PU that failed is it? It’s a spec fuel pump by the sounds of it. Ridiculous claim

[SchuMassa]

He put himself in position with key overtakes, as well as pressured Perez into the failure. If he was too far away from Perez it would have been possible for Perez to cruise home maybe.

Maybe. Or maybe the fuel pump just failed.

Seems RB underfueled. So again. LH was there to pressure perez. He coule have cruised to the end if he had a bigger gap.

Nothing indicates that RB underfueled. That's an unfounded claim. Also, let's not pretend Mercedes could put up a fight against RB for the majority of the race, they were nowhere near before the SC.

[Restomaniac]

Expect, they are not building it. It's all Honda still whatever the name is. They didn't even finish the building for powertrains.

Yeah, Honda will continue to provide support for 2022, but they have one foot out the door already. You know how it is.

Anyway, we'll see if this was a one-off or indicative of deeper problems.

It’s not the PU that failed is it? It’s a spec fuel pump by the sounds of it. Ridiculous claim

That only failed on 1 car manufacturer………on BOTH their sister cars. Convenient or astronomically unlucky you decide.

[NicoS]

Yeah, Honda will continue to provide support for 2022, but they have one foot out the door already. You know how it is.

Anyway, we'll see if this was a one-off or indicative of deeper problems.

It’s not the PU that failed is it? It’s a spec fuel pump by the sounds of it. Ridiculous claim

That only failed on 1 car manufacturer………on BOTH their sister cars. Convenient.

Was AT not electrical fire? or maybe you just make things up for added effect?

[f1316]

Dont know if it was mentioned.. But the Ferrari pitstops are much better this year!
The stops gave them the win.
Both stops Max could have got rhe undercut but the quick ferrari stops countered that.

No, for the first stop, Charles’ stop was longer than Max’s (I believe 3.1 vs 2.9 for Max) - it was Carlos who had 2.5 on the first stop. On the second, Ferrari gained 0.5 but the gap was around 1s coming out of the pit, so it would have been close - maybe more like first stop with back and forth overtake - but not a clear cut lead for Max.

What won the race for Ferrari was Charles having the better pace, plain and simple. He pulled out a 3-5s gap before each of the stops and that gave them room to react. Max was saying he could have pushed harder on outlaps to undercut, and that may be true, but I suspect the reason the team told him not to was because his tyres wouldn’t last if he did. Ultimately Leclerc had a small but crucial pace advantage.