Report: Carlos Sainz P4, Charles Leclerc DNF in Bahrain GP

“We said at the beginning of the year, our objective this year is to fight for the world championship and to win it. It has to be the case. Having said that, for the first race of this season, I see it as a bit more difficult and we are a little bit on the back foot on the race and that is why we made the choice of keeping one new soft. That will give us the best chance. Whether or not it will be enough to fight with the Red Bull? I don’t know.” – Charles Leclerc said with just a few hours until the first round of the 2023 F1 season, the Bahrain Grand Prix.

Max Verstappen and Red Bull may have been at the front, but this race was by no means over. The pole sitter had only won the Grand Prix in Bahrain on eight occasions since the first race in 2004, and there are two reasons. Firstly, it’s a track for plenty of overtaking – long straights, big braking zones and wide corners make for plenty of battles. The other fascinating thing is tyre strategy – even in the heat, the tyres can fall apart easily on the rough tarmac in Bahrain, which can lead to lots of different strategies.

That’s why Charles Leclerc decided to save a set of fresh tyres, but we also had to look out for Aston Martin – a team traditionally kind on their tyres as all eyes were on veteran Fernando Alonso. Could he claim his first win in almost a year?

The pit lane was open and the cars were making their way out to the track, which meant there was just 40 minutes until lights out in 2023! There were some final checks going on at Scuderia Ferrari to check the wheel brow from which Charles Leclerc lost some carbon fibre yesterday in Qualifying.

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It was therefore time to get some questions to some key answers in Formula 1 2023’s opener. Was Red Bull’s race pace as strong as expected or would the problems from practice return for the world champions? Were Ferrari, despite their pessimism, going to be able to challenge? Would dark horse Fernando Alonso emerge as the biggest threat? Were Mercedes going to get into the fight? It was time to race!

Max Verstappen led the cars on their formation lap and we were just minutes away from the first race of the 2023 Formula 1 season! Charles Leclerc started from P3 with the new soft tyres. Max Verstappen got away well and went into the first turn ahead of the Monegasque, who did well to get past Sergio Perez and into second. Carlos Sainz just couldn’t find the room to move up from fourth and he was chasing the second Red Bull. However, there was contact between the two Aston Martin cars as Lance Stroll clips the rear of team-mate Fernando Alonso: the Spaniard was told everything was okay with his car, but he dropped two places to seventh from his grid position of fifth.

It was still early days, but after getting a really good start, Max Verstappen looked comfortable and in control at the front. Charles Leclerc was now over three seconds away from the leader and the Mercedes were keeping the leaders well in view. Nico Hulkenberg was in the wars a bit early on as well, making contact with the rear of an Alpine which resulted in him losing part of his front wing.

On lap 6, Sergio Perez as within DRS range of Charles Leclerc and was looking to restore that Red Bull 1-2: he had 0.640s to make up, as Max Verstappen was lapping at least half a second quicker than the Monegasque behind him, seemingly without even pushing these tyres much. A few laps later, Sergio Perez was told by his team that he needn’t worry too much about Charles Leclerc in front of him as the tyre degradation would come to then. Clearly, Red Bull were expecting the Ferrari cars to drop off as those tyres got older.

On lap 14, Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz were given the call to head to the pits for a fresh set of tyres: they were double-stacked and headed out on the hard tyres. Great pit stops from the Maranello team, unfortunately the pace just wasn’t there to challenge Max Verstappen. The following lap Fernando Alonso also headed to the pits and returned to the track on hard tyres and in eighth position, while George Russell made his way back out onto the track in 10th and after quickly passing Kevin Magnussen, he was in eighth after Lance Stroll headed to the pits.

On lap 18 Sergio Perez was the leader but it was his turn to head into the pits for soft tyres. That moved Max Verstappen back up into first place and the Mexican came out in third around four seconds behind the Ferrari SF-23 of Charles. The Monegasque, running in second, had briefly taken the fastest lap away from George Russell – but the Ferrari man’s time was quickly superseded by Red Bull’s Sergio Perez.

Running on the much faster soft tyre as they come down to Turn One, Sergio Perez took his chance: the Mexican passed Charles Leclerc and as up into second. The Monegasque did his best to fight back but it was easy enough for the Red Bull to hold him off. Ferrari were going to have to try and do something here to bother Sergio Perez, as Charles Leclerc was now over five seconds away from the second-placed Red Bull and he needed to pick up the pace and bring himself in range.

Widway through the race, Carlos Sainz was called in for his second pit stop, with tyre management still a key issue on the Ferrari car. Two laps later, Charles Leclerc also made his second pit: it was another solid pit stop for Ferrari, as Charles returned to the track with a fresh set of hard tyres, going until the end of the race. At this stage the Ferrari drivers were sitting in fourth and fifth and were chasing down Fernando Alonso. Sergio Perez was the first of the Red Bulls to head in for the hard tyres and he came back out in second position. He had Charles Leclerc just over nine seconds behind him, as the SF-23 car clearly did not have the race pace to match the RB19 cars in Sakhir.

On lap 39, Fernando Alonso managed to go down the inside at Turn 10 and Lewis Hamilton did not see that coming: the Aston Martin driver was not 3 seconds behind Carlos Sainz and gradually recovering the gap to the Ferrari car.

Unfortunately for Charles Leclerc, his race ended on lap 41: he was going here and it looked like his power unit failed. “No, no, no! No power,” he said to his team on the radio. The yellow flag came out which was quickly replaced by a virtual safety car as they retrieve the stricken Ferrari. Things got even worse for the Maranello team, as Carlos Sainz was clearly in difficulty with the tyres and was quickly caught by Fernando Alonso: on his first attempt to pass the Ferrari man, Fernando Alonso nearly makes contact with the rear tyre, allowing Carlos to recover. However, Alonso came again and finally got the move done at Turn 11 to move up into third.

The 2023 Bahrain Grand Prix ended with the Red Bulls cruising out front: a comfortable first position for Max Verstappen out front, with his teammate Sergio Perez also cruising ten seconds behind him and almost 25 seconds clear of Alonso in third. Carlos Sainz ended the race in fourth place, on a difficult Sunday for Scuderia Ferrari in Sakhir.