2019 Bahrain F1 GP - Sakhir

[truefan72]

Renault comedy of errors. Wtf renault??? Poor hulkenberg. Ricciardo needs to up his game. Norris doing a phenominal job. Safety car will save leclerc a p3. What a race

[Tazio]

Wow!

[The Black Knight]

Am absolutely gutted for Leclerc - he deserved to win this. What a performance he put. He was simply amazing.

[truefan72]

How hamilton won and mercedes got a 1-2 against a dominant ferrari should be an episode in the twilight zone.
Take a bow Leclerc. At least he got a podium

[Starter]

Hamilton showed a lot of class in going to Leclerc at the end to congratulate him for the showing.

[Duncan]

What a race! Lots to say about today, but my biggest thought is that F1 suddenly got a lot more interesting.

Gutted for Leclerc. Really deserved the win, and despite being a Hamilton fan I was rooting for him in the last few laps. Still, his first win can't be far away. Terrific drive from him today.

Also a great drive from Hamilton, holding on to the back of Vettel despite a weirdly suboptimal tyre strategy, and passing what should have been the faster car once they were back on the same compound. Could be just a random unfortunate slip from Vettel, but he does seem to make stupid mistakes when he's under pressure. Threw away a lot of potential points for Ferrari with that spin.

Awesome showing from Lando Norris too. I was really expecting Kimi would round him up in the last few laps, but somehow he managed to hold on with Kimi what must have been crawling all over his gearbox, based on the gap showing on the timing pylon. Shame we didn't get to see it on the world feed; I'll have to go back and watch replays on F1 TV. And dare we say that McLaren is really back yet? Early days, but really promising race pace on top of the great qualifying pace. If they can just eliminate some of the unfortunate errors that put both drivers on the back foot early on, they could be looking really good. A podium can't be too far away.

I was obviously a little over harsh on Renault before the race; race pace looked much better than I was expecting given qualifying performance. If only they could a) stop driving into each other and b) not have their engines blow up they'd be in really good shape. Weird strategy on Ricciardo didn't help, but didn't matter in the end.

One last thing: I really hope that the world feed directors adjust to the new reality of a lot of stuff going on during the race and seriously cut back the amount of time they devote to replays. That was getting really annoying...

[Nitrodaze]

What a change of fortune? Poor Leclerc!

Bottas and Verstapenn may overtake him as well.

This is Formula one, it can be grossly unfair sometimes

[Nitrodaze]

Gearbox problems for Hamilton. There may be more drama yet.

[Nitrodaze]

Renault double DNF. I bet Redbull are chuckling

[airshifter]

Extremely mature race by Leclerc. From the recovery to his poor start, to dominating the pace when the car was holding together, to not losing his crap in the cockpit, and all the way through his post race remarks. Praise for the team after losing what should have been his first race win, rather than beating them up for it. I hope we see the car stay together and compete well enough to see him take a top step on the podium soon, he really deserves it.

As for Lewis and Bottas, humble in their positions and giving Leclerc all the credit he deserved. Both knew they got lucky, and got gave credit where credit is due.

As for the rest of the race, quite a bit of action everywhere. There were very few times when someone wasn't fighting for position on track, and that midfield action stayed fairly tight.


Oh yeah, Seb. Once again screwing himself when there was no need, and giving away positions. It would be great to see him battle through part of the field to a decent finish if he wasn't the one that caused the loss of positions for a change. If things keep up, Charles is going to be deep into his head within a couple more races. Prepare for the whining to begin!

Gasly dog of the race IMO. Though Renault lost both cars and Ricciardo had a strange strategy move, I think RB are probably already wishing they either managed to keep Daniel on, or found a better driver to replace him. Only time will tell.

Mclaren might be back in the hunt. Very surprised that Norris managed to hold Kimi off at the end, and it took some good driving as well as a decent car.

Speaking of Kimi...... He's currently 6th in the standings in the Alfa Romeo. Who would have thought it could happen?