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Vettel wins in Bahrain by slimmest of margins from Bottas, disaster for Red Bulls

Writer's picture: Andrew ZarbAndrew Zarb


Sebastian Vettel has won the Bahrain Grand Prix by the slimmest of margins to Mercedes driver Valtteri Bottas, a mere 0.699s, after just holding him off on tyres which were considerably worn. Fellow Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton finished in third-place after coming through from ninth place, whilst Pierre Gasly finished a remarkable fourth place for Toro Rosso and earned the Driver of the Day award.

At the start, Vettel got a good getaway and led into turn 1, but Bottas managed to overtake Kimi Raikkonen for second place. Gasly made an impressive getaway and did overtake Ricciardo for fourth, though he was passed back not long after. The joy for Ricciardo was short-lived, however, as he retired from the race with a suspected electrical issue.

On lap 2, Max Verstappen, who was behind Hamilton, tried to overtake him and seemingly got the move done, but he tried squeezing him off and made contact with Hamilton's tyre in what was a clumsy and brainless manoeuvre, from which he suffered a puncture and retired with damage caused by the puncture.

A VSC (Virtual Safety Car) period was called as a result of all the bumping and barging at the start. On the restart, Hamilton made an impressive overtake where he took 3 cars at once - Nico Hulkenberg, Esteban Ocon and Fernando Alonso to move up into sixth place. He quickly got past Kevin Magnussen for fifth, and soon after passed Gasly for fourth. Meanwhile, Brendon Hartley was given a 10s time-penalty (which he served in his pitstop) for his role in a collision with Sergio Perez.

On lap 19, Sebastian Vettel pitted for the soft tyres, whilst a lap later Ferrari team-mate Kimi Raikkonen also pitted for soft tyres. A lap later, Bottas pitted - and went out on medium tyres. At this point, it seemed as though Mercedes had made a great strategic move - as the mediums would have gone to the end without problem and thus they would not have had to stop again, but the Ferraris would have struggled on the softs to make it to the end and would likely have needed to stop again. Hamilton pitted 6 laps later (he was on the soft rather than the super-soft tyres, and hence the rather more durable tyre), and also switched to the medium tyres.

Raikkonen did make a second stop, and was set to go back out on the super-softs, however, he ran over a mechanic on exiting the pit box - as the system turned green which enabled him to get going - but one of the tyres had not even been removed, and, in the process of doing so, ran over a mechanic who was trying to insert the tyre. Unfortunately, the mechanic suffered a shinbone and fibula fracture as a result of the incident. We at Zarb times sincerely wish the mechanic a speedy recovery from the incident, and sincerely hope that he is OK. Ferrari have been fined €50,000 for the incident due to an unsafe release.

Bottas towards the end began to rapidly close the gap on Vettel, who was struggling on his soft tyres, but he made the one-stop strategy work and just fended off the Finn in the end. Hamilton completed the podium, whilst Gasly managed a remarkable fourth. Kevin Magnussen did an impressive job in securing fifth place for Haas, whilst Marcus Ericsson did an outstanding job for Sauber in making a one-stop strategy work and finished in ninth place, earning his first points in Formula 1 since the 2015 Italian Grand Prix, whilst Esteban Ocon earned Force India their first point of the season.

Also, Sergio Perez and Brendon Hartley were each awarded a 30s time-penalty for not following correct procedure on the formation lap: "Car 11 (Perez) overtook car 28 (Hartley) before Turn 1 and then during the remainder of the formation lap made no noticeable effort to allow car 28 to regain his position.

"The driver of car 11 also admitted the driver of car 28 was not unduly delayed when leaving the grid to start the formation lap.

"In this case the stewards decided to not award penalty points as the penalty is thesufficient.

"Car 28 was overtaken by car 11 during the formation lap, failed to re-establish his position before the first safety car line and then did not enter the pits as required under Article 38.3."

Classification:

Sebastian Vettel - Ferrari

Valtteri Bottas - Mercedes

Lewis Hamilton - Mercedes

Pierre Gasly - Scuderia Toro Rosso-Honda

Kevin Magnussen - Haas-Ferrari

Nico Hulkenberg - Renault

Fernando Alonso - McLaren-Renault

Stoffel Vandoorne - McLaren-Renault

Marcus Ericsson - Sauber-Ferrari

Esteban Ocon - Force India-Mercedes

Carlos Sainz - Renault

Charles Leclerc - Sauber-Ferrari

Romain Grosjean - Haas-Ferrari

Lance Stroll - Williams-Mercedes

Sergey Sirotkin - Williams-Mercedes

Sergio Perez - Force India-Mercedes

Brendon Hartley - Scuderia Toro Rosso-Honda

Did not finish the race and not classified: Kimi Raikkonen, Max Verstappen and Daniel Ricciardo

World Championship classification:

Sebastian Vettel - 50 points

Lewis Hamilton - 33 points

Valtteri Bottas - 22 points

Fernando Alonso - 16 points

Kimi Raikkonen - 15 points

Nico Hulkenberg - 14 points

Daniel Ricciardo - 12 points

Pierre Gasly - 12 points

Kevin Magnussen - 10 points

Max Verstappen - 8 points

Stoffel Vandoorne - 6 points

Marcus Ericsson - 2 points

Carlos Sainz - 1 point

Esteban Ocon - 1 point

Sergio Perez - 0 points

Charles Leclerc - 0 points

Romain Grosjean - 0 points

Lance Stroll - 0 points

Brendon Hartley - 0 points

Sergey Sirotkin - 0 points

Constructors' Championship classification:

Ferrari - 65 points

Mercedes - 55 points

McLaren-Renault - 22 points

Red Bull Racing-TAG Heuer - 20 points

Renault - 15 points

Scuderia Toro Rosso-Honda - 12 points

Haas-Ferrari - 10 points

Sauber-Ferrari - 2 points

Force India-Mercedes - 1 point

Williams-Mercedes - 0 points


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