Welcome Drivers!

The 2023 Bahrain GP is officially finished and it lived up to the hype! Some teams had monster results in the first race of the season while others went from bad to worse.

We will be giving our initial reactions to the Bahrain GP and all of the happenings during the race.

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Lets get to our key takeaways from the first race of the 2023 season!

Bahrain GP: Race Takeaways

Red Bull Flex Their Muscles

Coming into this weekend this result wouldn’t have surprised anyone. The RB19 was the fastest car in testing and it looked as if they were miles ahead of the pack. However, during practice and qualifying it looked as if the other teams had closed the gap a bit to Red Bull. Potentially making the championship race a much bigger question mark this year.

Red Bull put those thoughts to bed early on in the race. Max Verstappen looked like he was on an easy Sunday morning drive. He was never really challenged at any point during the race. A dominant display from the defending champion and his first win at the Bahrain GP.

Sergio Perez got off to a poor start in the race losing a position to Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc. This did not last too long as it was quickly apparent that the Red Bull’s race pace was far superior to Ferrari. Perez stuck with soft tires for his second stint and made quick work passing Leclerc to secure a 1-2 finish for Red Bull.

It was a perfect start to the season for a team who scored 0 points here one year ago. Now they will be looking to extend their lead at Jeddah in two weeks time. If you are the superstitious type, Red Bull will also be fighting the season opener curse. The driver to win the season opening race has come in second the last 6 seasons. Red Bull is currently in a prime position to break that trend.

Alonso is the Man of the Hour

Things couldn’t have gone any better for the Spaniard. He was quick all weekend and he only solidified Aston Martin’s pace by finishing with a podium behind only the Red Bulls. He deserved the podium with several fantastic overtakes and an aggressive drive that allowed him to finish ahead of both Mercedes and the Ferrari of Sainz.

The race got off to a rocky start for Alonso as his teammate Lance Stroll ran into the back of him at turn 4 on the first lap. Fortunately for Alonso, there was no damage to his car but he was now behind both Mercedes drivers.

Throughout the entire race Alonso whittled down the gap to Mercedes eventually reeling in George Russel. Russell fought aggressively with Alonso to hold on to his place but inevitably had to yield to Alonso. His next target was Lewis Hamilton. Alonso had 4 laps fresher tires than Hamilton and put in some blinding lap times to catch up to the 7-time champ.

Alonso was able to catch Hamilton off-guard into turn 10 with an incredible overtake up the inside. Turn 10 is not a typical place we see overtakes occurring which makes this one all the more impressive.

To make things even better for Aston Martin, Charles Leclrec suffered an engine failure at the end of the race and Carlos Sainz was dealing with tire degradation issues allowing Alonso to slot in at P3. Clinching him is first podium since the 2021 Qatar GP.

After the race, Alonso lauded his teammate Stroll, who finished the race in P6 despite racing with broken bones in his hands and wrists. It’s shaping up to be a great year for the Silverstone squad and look to have to potential to be competing with Ferrari!

Ferrari Woes

All was going well for Ferrari late into the race. They had accepted that their cars did not have the pace to keep up with Red Bull. Their drivers were holding onto P3 & P4 and it looked as if the other teams would not be able to touch them.

This quickly changed as F1 races can do. Charles Leclerc suddenly lost power coming out of turn 13. He was unable to recover the engine and had to pull to the side of the track and retire the car.

Almost simultaneously, the duo of Alonso and Hamilton were rapidly closing the gap to Carlos Sainz. The team asked Sainz to push be he responded saying that he would not be able to push on his set of tires without doing another pit stop. Sainz was ultimately passed by Alonso but held back Lewis Hamilton and finished P4.

This was not the start of the season Ferrari was hoping for. Last year they struggled with reliability and it bit them again in the 2023 season opener. They will be looking to get on top of this quickly before Red Bull gets too far ahead.

McLaren Looks to be Much Worse than Thought

McLaren’s season is looking to be one of their most disappointing in recent memory. Their drivers started on the back foot in P11 and P18 and it only got worse from there.

Oscar Piastri was battling at the back of the pack when he suffered from an electronics issues. He was told to box and they tried to replace the steering wheel in his MCL60 but that did not dix the issue. They had to retire the car in the pit lane.

Lando Norris actually had a strong start to the race and was in points scoring position at one point. He ultimately suffered from a hydraulic leak and had to pit stop more frequently than other teams. In the end, he pitted 6 times and finished in last place 2 laps behind the leaders.

It was a very sad day for McLaren and it does not look like it will get much better anytime soon. They have the talent for points scoring opportunities but it appears their already slow car also suffers from reliability issues. It may be a long season for McLaren fans.

Head Scratching Moments from Alpine

One of the stranger moments was how Esteban Ocon handled a penalty he received at the race start. At the end of the formation lap he had inadvertently rolled too far from his grid spot resulting in a 5 second penalty during the race. In the early parts of the race he also made contact with another driver and had a damaged front wing.

Things got even stranger when he came into the pit to change his front wing and serve his time penalty. When a driver is serving a time penalty the team is not allowed to touch the car for the duration of the time penalty. Once the time is up they are allowed to work on the car. Apparently when Ocon came in the team had started to work on the car too early.

Once Ocon had left the pit lane he was notified that he had not served his time penalty correctly, resulting in another 10 second penalty. The even stranger thing was that Ocon was also caught speeding while exiting the pit lane resulting in a third penalty. His next pit stop he would have to serve a 15 second time penalty.

Alpine ultimately retired the car to save resources for later in the season. While all of this was happening, Gasly put in an amazing effort finishing P9 after starting in last place. A bright spot in an otherwise gloomy day for Alpine.

Williams Impressive Start

The team that surprised us the most (other than Aston Martin) was arguably Williams Racing. After a year where they finished in last place they were able to score points in the opening race of the season.

Alex Albon brought home P10 and the F1 rookie Logan Sargeant didn’t look too bad either finishing two spots behind in P12. This is the exact start that Williams was looking for. They know they won’t be in the hunt for big points so days like these were they can take home small amounts mean a lot for the back marker teams.

Williams should be able to continue this run and pull themselves back up into midfield contention.

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We will be back Tuesday with update Power Rankings based on the Bahrain GP. There will be a lot of movement both up and down.

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