Bahrain GP 2018 - Race Thread

[wisepie]

Amazing race but my celebration was cut short. My best friend, our Pomeranian, Rosie, passed away only hours after the race. She knew how much I love Ferrari F1, I hope she brings us luck from above this season.

Condolences on your loss, even our victory won't have made your day any less painful, she will be wishing us well from above for sure.

[enjaybel3]

Condolences on your loss, even our victory won't have made your day any less painful, she will be wishing us well from above for sure.

Sorry to hear that mate, it's very tough losing a loved pet.

[WS6TransAm01]

Thanks gents! She spent many a Sunday morning sitting next to me on the couch watching F1. She always made sure I walked and fed her before I was allowed to sit down and watch the race. I hope she brings us luck from above.

[Riccardog]

Thanks gents! She spent many a Sunday morning sitting next to me on the couch watching F1. She always made sure I walked and fed her before I was allowed to sit down and watch the race. I hope she brings us luck from above.

RIP to a well loved pet I think! she'll always be in your heart.
I know all mine will always be with me!!!

[mizf1]

Anyone able to copy and paste the article?

https://www.autosport.com/f1/feature...the-bahrain-gp

It's by Gary Anderson, knowing him it probably go something like this
1.Mercesdes
2.Red Bull
3. Mclaren
4.Torro Rosso
5. HAAS
6. Ferrari

[FerrariF60]

Anyone able to copy and paste the article?

https://www.autosport.com/f1/feature...the-bahrain-gp

It's by Gary Anderson, knowing him it probably go something like this
1.Mercesdes
2.Red Bull
3. Mclaren
4.Torro Rosso
5. HAAS
6. Ferrari

knowing how much of a merc bias he is i wouldn't doubt he classifies us as the 6th best team....lol

[ramesh]

They say results don't lie, and if you want to know the best at the end of the season you simply look at the results. Right now, that means Ferrari and Mercedes are the best teams in Formula 1.

But after Mercedes' difficulties at the start of the season, losing two races it should have won, you have to ask whether such a well-resourced and set up team should be making those sorts of errors. You could also say Ferrari is now alone as the best, having won two out of two, but even then there are some reservations. Sometimes you have to look further down the grid and take into account other factors to decide who is the best, as the Bahrain Grand Prix demonstrated.

The old problems Mercedes has had with the softer tyre compounds seemed to return on the Bahrain weekend, particularly in qualifying. It was that problem that left its cars third and fourth on Saturday, and meant Mercedes was playing track position catch up on Sunday when the car was quick, because once the tyres lose that initial bite, things equal out.

During pre-season testing, many comments were made about how Lewis Hamilton could pivot the car around its front end, whereas the Ferrari would just run wide when the drivers tried to find that little bit of extra corner speed. I think this is why, in Melbourne, the Mercedes was a rocketship in qualifying - that was a front-end requirement circuit and Ferrari was lacking in that area.

In Bahrain, things flipped around. When the Mercedes is pivoting around the front end, it is overheating the rear tyres and then suffers from a traction deficit - a big problem at this circuit. The Ferrari still carries that bit of understeer, but crucially this protects the rears.

I said during pre-season testing, when the Mercedes did the majority of its running on the medium tyres, that it might rue the day that more time wasn't spent working on the softer compounds. Doubly so given Mercedes knew the tyre balance at the softer end of the range was a problem last year.

You can see this up and down the grid in terms of the performance swings. It's not as though any car has armfuls of understeer or massive traction problems, it's fine margins that are dictated by the inherent DNA of the car's layout. One tenth lost here for one chassis and another tenth gained for another gives a crucial performance swing, particularly in the midfield. Long may it continue.

And then we had McLaren, outqualified by all of the Renault-powered cars save for Max Verstappen, who crashed in Q1. Humiliatingly for McLaren, both Toro Rossos were ahead - using the same Honda engines McLaren rejected for 2018 at a huge cost. And all this in what Fernando Alonso once claimed was the best chassis.

Red Bull will be keeping a very close eye on the Honda engine package

So what's really gone wrong there? It's probably quite simple in that the team believed its own hype for far too long. The car looked pretty decent in pre-season, but I think we can now assume that it did a lot of its testing on low fuel, which always makes a car look lively and responsive. But that just clouds the visibility of the inherent issues that most cars will have. To fix it, first you need to recognise it. That's what pre-season testing is all about.

McLaren did score points with both cars in Australia and Bahrain and points are what matters - holding third in the constructors' championship is a decent achievement but the car is nowhere near good enough to stay there. To challenge for podiums, you need out and out performance and, at minimum, you need to be mixing it with the top six.

For wins, you need to be knocking on the door of the front row, otherwise you are relying on luck, and advantageous circumstances don't come around very often. Just look how few and far between Red Bull's race wins have been since 2014.

Toro Rosso, by finishing fourth, wasn't far off a podium, but that's with three of the top six cars out of the equation. The gap to being in the top six on merit is huge. But you have to hand it to the former Minardi team, which excelled on a day when the main Red Bull team lost both cars early on.

Using Honda engines and with a young star in Pierre Gasly, who turned in the drive of the day, Toro Rosso delivered a result McLaren couldn't in three seasons with Honda. Red Bull will be keeping a very close eye on progress with that engine package.

Autosport always rates the drivers after each grand prix, but I think it's time we did a team rating. It's not always the teams that score the big results that deserve the credit because you have to factor in the size of team, budget and driver experience. Here's my team ranking for the Bahrain Grand Prix:
1 Toro Rosso

Qualifying sixth, starting fifth because of penalties and finishing fourth just shows what this small, tight-budgeted team can do. It took on the Honda engine package that McLaren dismissed, and by working together has shown what working as one can achieve.
2 Mercedes

Its Bahrain challenge really went out the window on Saturday. Third and fourth in qualifying with Hamilton getting a five-place gearbox penalty shows this wasn't its best weekend. The speed wasn't really there and the gearbox durability is questionable.
3 Sauber

Marcus Ericsson drove a good race and the team took a gamble on strategy that worked out, netting it a couple of very valuable points. If Sauber keeps improving as it has done so far this year, it will be right in that midfield fight soon.
4 Haas

It was a bit of an up-and-down weekend for Haas and I don't really know where it stands. It is clearly in fairly good shape, but if there is ever an opportunity for its drivers to get involved in a skirmish it seems to manage to get right in there. Perhaps when it all settles down, it will begin to flow a little easier for the team. Sometimes, when a small team is doing well it is easy to get overexcited.
5 Ferrari

You might ask why Ferrari is way down here when it won the race and locked out the front row. Well, this is a team sport and Ferrari first sent the car out with a loose wheel during practice and earned a fine. In the race, it screwed up another pitstop, resulting in a mechanic getting run over and breaking his leg. For a team to win the constructors' championship, you need two cars finishing every weekend. Ferrari needs to do this to ensure the good work it is doing doesn't go to waste.

Another proposal to make racing better, cut costs, equalise the prize fund, with noisier and cheaper engines and Saturday qualifying races...

6 Renault

A bit hit and miss over these first two races. The speed is not far away and Nico Hulkenberg gets the best out of it on most occasions, but now Honda looks from this one race that it is just about as good as the Renault engine things might just start to get that bit tougher.
7 McLaren

Its pre-season was compromised by reliability problems, so I suppose we should cut McLaren a bit of slack for that. But all its problems have been self-inflicted. The car is definitely better on a Sunday than it is on a Saturday so that just shows the team is not getting the best from new tyres in qualifying.
8 Force India

At the moment, it is a mere shadow of what it was over the last two seasons. Force India never really had the out-and-out pace but its racecraft and tyre usage made up for that. But currently, it is struggling a bit with both. That midfield battle is tough but when the going gets tough the tough get going so it's all in the team's hands. Fortunately, it does seem to have finally got a handle on the package, so let's see if it can build on that in China.
9 Red Bull

These guys are supposed to be championship challengers, and if what we saw on Sunday was it offering up that challenge then there is a long way to go. If Red Bull continues like this, then both drivers will get very frustrated very quickly.
10 Williams

The last two cars still running at the flag, and as Williams uses the Mercedes engine this doesn't bode well. It has got itself into this position and the technical team will be scratching their collective heads as to whether it is the drivers or the chassis. I suggest a bit of both, but to have inexperienced drivers driving a poor chassis makes it doubly difficult to recover.

In Bahrain we also heard about Liberty Media's new proposals to fix F1. Or rather, it issued a very short summary of what has been proposed.

I wish I had £10,000 for every time I have heard a proposal that includes regulations to make racing better, cost cutting, budget control, equalisation of the prize fund, noisier and cheaper engines and Saturday qualifying races. It's like listening to an old recording time and time again.

And then, on top of that, the FIA proposes having a larger section rear wing flap that makes the DRS work better. Please listen to your customers - the enthusiast and viewer. After all the fan surveys that have been done no-one, including even the people involved in F1, want DRS overtaking. We only want cars racing closely together and hopefully that would lead to the odd overtaking manoeuvre. We don't want it every lap and we don't want a drive-by manoeuvre, just close racing.

The interesting thing is that F1 puts these proposals together, but there is never enough contact with the written or televised media and the outside world as to what they see as the problem. I'm not talking about me, but there are a lot of media people out there that would love to be able to write or talk about how good F1 is but none of the powers that be bother to ask them what will make that possible.

Instead, they just put together another group to research potential changes that some, if not all of the teams, will reject in one way or another - or the plans just won't work anyway.

Remember when the overtaking problem was supposed to be solved for 2009 by proposals put forward by the Overtaking Working Group? I said at the time that a first-year aerodynamic student would have seen through the naivety of that proposal in a very short amount of time, and I was proved correct.

Hopefully, it won't be the same when we see the 2021 proposals. If they ever show us - the customer.

But there was one thing that was encouraging about the Bahrain GP, and what we've seen so far, hopefully for the rest of the season. The midfield pack is extremely tight, and if you ignore the big three teams we have 'class' wins for McLaren and Toro Rosso from the first two races. Perhaps if F1 can make that the front font of the field, we could have exactly what we're looking for.

And given how well Toro Rosso has done, that might change everyone's perception of who the best team really is.

[Greig]

LOL I dunno why people pay attention to Gary Anderson.

[Ferrarichamp]

Mr Anderson, isn't he a character in 'beavis & butthead'?

[mizf1]

LOL I dunno why people pay attention to Gary Anderson.

It's funny when he makes a fool it of himself again and again.

Thanks Ramesh for the article

[mizf1]

How did he rank Merc 2nd?

Here are a few things they messed up on.
1. The win was there for the taking, Toto said 90% certain. They applied pressure to Vettel too late
2. They got bluffed by Ferrari, Merc thought Ferrari would pit again and we caught them out.
3. Communication to Hamilton was poor, the guy didn't know what was happening.

Apart from the mistake Ferrari made with Kimi, everything else was pretty much spot on. Qualified 1st and 2nd and got the win.

[mizf1]

I know we had issues with my pit stops in FP and the race. The positive is we had the fastest Pit stop in Bahrain, Seb with 2.24secs

[jgonzalesm6]

Best Onboards | 2018 Bahrain Grand Prix

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kq6bLFs0QYE

Max vs Hamilton AND Alonso (starts at :30sec)..the puncture on Max.....Where was Max to go???? He was almost on top of Alonso???



Verstappen vs. Hamilton Bahrain 2018 Start (announcers are German)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8MLK6FXdA94

Pay attention to the slow-motion part of the vid and keep an eye on Hamiltons gloves as he turns more into Max (14 sec mark).

Pics and you can clearly see Hamiltons glove turning more into Max.

Attachment 7404

Attachment 7405

Attachment 7406


I agree this was a racing incident, this certainly does not look like it's solely Max's fault. Hamilton could have braked or ran off the track....kinda like what Hamilton did to Nico at the 2015 USGP in turn 1 at the start of the race; both bumped and Nico went wide.

here's the link to the 2015 USGP

Formula 1 2015 GP United States Official Race Edit

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3bGenKpuXk&t=40s

[Silent Bob]

Problem is that Max makes those moves hoping the guy next to him moves out of the way. When you're at the limit of the track like hamilton was, how are you supposed to know the guy making the pass is sliding into you and has gone in too hot for the corner? You hope he would leave you enough room, like most drivers would. Plus if Max had made the corner he would have rear ended Alonso. It was typical Max "it's not my fault" crash move. Remember when Hamilton would try those in his younger days and it seemed every race he would take out Massa and vice versa?

[jgonzalesm6]

Problem is that Max makes those moves hoping the guy next to him moves out of the way. When you're at the limit of the track like hamilton was, how are you supposed to know the guy making the pass is sliding into you and has gone in too hot for the corner? You hope he would leave you enough room, like most drivers would. Plus if Max had made the corner he would have rear ended Alonso. It was typical Max "it's not my fault" crash move. Remember when Hamilton would try those in his younger days and it seemed every race he would take out Massa and vice versa?

In this case, Max overtook Hamilton...then Hamilton turned more into him.

[enjaybel3]

In this case, Max overtook Hamilton...then Hamilton turned more into him.

Thanks for sharing the video and images. When I watched it in real time I felt sure Hamilton would be penalised. I think the data you provided and your analysis validates that Lewis was indeed very lucky to get away with such a dangerous move. Personally I think this was a lot more dangerous that the contact Seb initiated against Lewis in Baku last year.
In the attached image I've highlighted, from a few frames further along in your video, how Max had completed the pass when the contact was actually initiated by Lewis (who you can clearly see is still turning his front wing into Max's tire) all the while Lewis had a full car width of space to move over. He only needs to keep a part of one tire inside the track boundary. There was plenty of space for Lewis, he did not have to steer into Max to stay within the track limits at the point he caused the contact.
Lewis definitely dodged a "penalty" bullet here.

ClassicHamboneMove.JPG

[aroutis]

Mr Anderson, isn't he a character in 'beavis & butthead'?

More like in the Matrix!

[mwk360]

Best Onboards | 2018 Bahrain Grand Prix

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kq6bLFs0QYE

Max vs Hamilton AND Alonso (starts at :30sec)..the puncture on Max.....Where was Max to go???? He was almost on top of Alonso???



Verstappen vs. Hamilton Bahrain 2018 Start (announcers are German)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8MLK6FXdA94

Pay attention to the slow-motion part of the vid and keep an eye on Hamiltons gloves as he turns more into Max (14 sec mark).

Pics and you can clearly see Hamiltons glove turning more into Max.

Attachment 7404

Attachment 7405

Attachment 7406


I agree this was a racing incident, this certainly does not look like it's solely Max's fault. Hamilton could have braked or ran off the track....kinda like what Hamilton did to Nico at the 2015 USGP in turn 1 at the start of the race; both bumped and Nico went wide.

here's the link to the 2015 USGP

Formula 1 2015 GP United States Official Race Edit

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3bGenKpuXk&t=40s

both guys look foolish and bullish, ham definitely turning into max there was more room left for him then i initially saw but max went way to deep he could've turned in early brake slightly and still take the position behind alonso. max kamakazi caused the collision but hamilton had room to avoid turning into him

[jragona]

Interesting article about the Ferrari changes for Bahrain:

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/h...lties-1024781/

[mwk360]

Interesting article about the Ferrari changes for Bahrain:

https://www.motorsport.com/f1/news/h...lties-1024781/

reading the article and watching that video - Ferrari didn't solve it's issues by just some simple setup the way social media are saying that's a lie imo, there is numerous tiny tiny modifications that ferrari have brought to Bahrain since Melbourne, looking at the front wing, diffuser and bargeboard area it seems there were modified in smart ways to suit the track and thank goodness it worked that's what i like. fast continuous progress :D

[ScuderiaBuckeye]

My take on the Max/Hammy incident is that Max went for a strong but risky overtaking maneuver in the braking zone and missed his ideal apex so he went wide. Hamilton is a racer and isn't just going to "concede" the position even though Max had the inside line so he did what a real racer does and makes sure he uses the track that is there also. Hammy could have avoided all contact by running off the track but there wasn't room for him to use any more track w/o him turning the way he did. He has a right to use the track just like Max does. As far as the contact that situation (front wing contact w/ rear tire) typically results in a puncture of the tire but Hamilton is extremely lucky in this case not to have had his front wing destroyed necessitating a pit stop to change the wing. Frankly this is racing to me and I would rather see these guys do this than try to avoid it entirely.

It was the very definition of a racing incident and Max's attempted pass looks like exactly what Vettel had to do last year at Canada to pass the Force Indias...basically barge his way through under braking and say to the person getting passed yield to me or we will both be out of the race.

As far as Max goes, he is undoubtedly extremely talented but let's remember he is young and he will likely mature. When he is a more mature driver I at this point have no problem seeing him in Ferrari someday, though right now I would prefer DR in Kimi's seat.

[Silent Bob]

I think a big part of Max's problem is that most of his incidents come in the opening laps when there is a lot of stuff happening. If he would have made that move on the 3rd or 4th lap, I'm sure Hamilton would have maybe given way knowing that Max was quicker and he could concentrate on his own pace In the opening laps when everyone is trying to dodge traffic, no one wants to lose positions.

[Brembo]

Louis, Seb Dan, Bottas, + the rest, " Where's Max !! " every race.

[jgonzalesm6]

My take on the Max/Hammy incident is that Max went for a strong but risky overtaking maneuver in the braking zone and missed his ideal apex so he went wide. Hamilton is a racer and isn't just going to "concede" the position even though Max had the inside line so he did what a real racer does and makes sure he uses the track that is there also. Hammy could have avoided all contact by running off the track but there wasn't room for him to use any more track w/o him turning the way he did. He has a right to use the track just like Max does. As far as the contact that situation (front wing contact w/ rear tire) typically results in a puncture of the tire but Hamilton is extremely lucky in this case not to have had his front wing destroyed necessitating a pit stop to change the wing. Frankly this is racing to me and I would rather see these guys do this than try to avoid it entirely.

It was the very definition of a racing incident and Max's attempted pass looks like exactly what Vettel had to do last year at Canada to pass the Force Indias...basically barge his way through under braking and say to the person getting passed yield to me or we will both be out of the race.

As far as Max goes, he is undoubtedly extremely talented but let's remember he is young and he will likely mature. When he is a more mature driver I at this point have no problem seeing him in Ferrari someday, though right now I would prefer DR in Kimi's seat.

+1

[Brembo]

DR want's only Seb's seat, Max will take Kimi's seat and make it #1 . He will just need to shut the radio when the race starts!

[mwk360]

Like someone else said max drives with a nothing to lose mentality. He would happily DNF 20 races lose all the points if he could win 1 race. K-Mag has started off well this season i hope Haas can get stronger and trouble RB

[enjaybel3]

My take on the Max/Hammy incident is that Max went for a strong but risky overtaking maneuver in the braking zone and missed his ideal apex so he went wide. Hamilton is a racer and isn't just going to "concede" the position even though Max had the inside line so he did what a real racer does and makes sure he uses the track that is there also. Hammy could have avoided all contact by running off the track but there wasn't room for him to use any more track w/o him turning the way he did. He has a right to use the track just like Max does. As far as the contact that situation (front wing contact w/ rear tire) typically results in a puncture of the tire but Hamilton is extremely lucky in this case not to have had his front wing destroyed necessitating a pit stop to change the wing. Frankly this is racing to me and I would rather see these guys do this than try to avoid it entirely.

It was the very definition of a racing incident and Max's attempted pass looks like exactly what Vettel had to do last year at Canada to pass the Force Indias...basically barge his way through under braking and say to the person getting passed yield to me or we will both be out of the race.

As far as Max goes, he is undoubtedly extremely talented but let's remember he is young and he will likely mature. When he is a more mature driver I at this point have no problem seeing him in Ferrari someday, though right now I would prefer DR in Kimi's seat.

I think this is a pretty good assessment and I'm mostly in agreement with what you've posted. One point, where both the data and I disagree is the part I've highlighted from your post. If you look at the images I've posted in my earlier post you will see that, at the point of contact, Lewis had the complete width of his car within the track limits (all 4 tires). As you know, he only needs to keep part of one tire within the track limits, so we can clearly see Lewis could have move a tire width over, stayed on track and avoided contact. He simply didn't need to turn in that hard especially given that Max was, at the point of impact, a car length ahead of him already and in Lewis's full vision.

[jgonzalesm6]

Comparing Max. speeds of BahrainGP qualifying - 2018 vs 2017:
- Ferrari slightly faster than Mercedes
- Toro Rosso has gained most on speed trap
- Williams by 13kph slower, aero not working properly

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DalAqLIU0AAMNR-.jpg

[512 TR]

With the disenchantment with overall result in Bahrain behind me I'm very happy with Seb's win. Although the sour taste is still there because The Scuderia should have outscored Merc in Bahrain as well. Just because the team was lucky in Australia doesn't automatically have to mean you have to perform below your ability in the next race. We could have had a massive lead in the WCC without the pitstop mishap. We could have been on 80 points (Kimi 3rd in Bahrian) and Merc then on 52 points. Even with Kimi in 4th we could have been on 77 points. Now, even though the Scuderia has won both races we only lead by 10 points. As for China, you're rarely just as competitive there as in Bahrain and vice versa (if you're not last few years Merc). There is a difference in tyres, surface, air, temp, humidity etc even though both circuits are quite similar with a stop-and-go section and a twisty section. We should probably do OK with tyres but the US tyre will be impossible to use the same way as the SS. Red Bull will also be stronger in China. We need to score good points with both cars. It's doable, not sure about another win though. If one of our drivers beat one Merc I will think it's a success.