The tremendous final of the World Cup that rushed into Abu Dhabi three months ago had a replica at its height at the start of the new course, in a Bahrain Grand Prix that anticipates a high-voltage season, precisely what the promoters of the Great Circus had consciously planned. The cotton test gave reason to the promoters of the shaking given this winter to the technical regulations of a World Cup that has a different color than in recent times. The victory achieved by Charles Leclerc is also the first for Ferrari in two and a half years, and the verification of one of the hunch that left the preseason: the Scuderia it’s back.
The two previous victories on the Monegasque’s service record, both in 2019 (Italy and Belgium), were an anomaly if one takes into account the inertia installed then in a championship completely in the hands of Mercedes. This third one leaves an absolutely different residue because it gives all the credit in the world to the work carried out by the Maranello crew in the F1-75, a single-seater that, in addition to being beautiful, is also very sharp.
The second place of Carlos Sainz verifies the good health of the racing car The Prancing Horsewhich has not seen its two drivers in the box since the 2019 Singapore Grand Prix. In any case, the crush of the Italian structure can only be explained from the Red Bull trigger.
The energetic team had secured second place with Max Verstappen, before the current world champion’s car froze two laps from the end, the same fate that Checo Pérez suffered a few meters from the checkered flag and when he was already caressing the podium. A real blow for the red buffalo team, which faced this premiere as the main favorite and left with the basket completely empty, without being able to say a word. Favored by the dropouts of the Dutch and the Mexican, Lewis Hamilton completed the box and saved the Mercedes furniture, which in Bahrain confirmed the pile of duties that he has ahead of him if he doesn’t want to miss the step. Fernando Alonso finished ninth, a more than good result if he attends to the spin process in which Alpine lives installed.
The pre-season tests warned of the success of Ferrari and Red Bull, and of the puddle in which the star constructor seemed to have gotten into. The race at Sakhir validated the first and third of these points, waiting to see if the Austrian brand can find the trigger for the debacle it suffered at this first stop on the calendar.
Leclerc dominated the scene from cover to cover – something a Ferrari driver had not achieved since Belgium 2018, with Sebastian Vettel – and there is no better way to prove it than the numbers: victory, pole position and fast lap for the new leader of the contest, the first Monegasque to do so. After carrying out a practically surgical start, the Ferrari driver was only threatened by Verstappen after the first change of tires, a moment that the Dutchman took advantage of to take out his fangs and throw himself at the neck of his rival, who was able to contain the beast and , in addition, causing him to crush the tires of his prototype.
The emergence of the safety car as a result of the fire in Pierre Gasly’s Alpha Tauri (lap 46 of 57), gave the boy from Hasselt another trick. Under normal conditions, Mad Max would have attacked without flinching, if not for the fact that he began to notice that the steering wheel of his RB18 was heavier than normal, a technical problem that, in any case, had nothing to do with the one that led him to abandon then.
“I am very happy because the last two years have been very difficult for us. The team knew that this was an opportunity and it has given us a great car”, agreed Charles Leclerc, who with this victory broke the second longest drought in the history of the red cars –45 races–. “Ferrari is back and it’s really back. And that was not an easy weekend for me, because I didn’t have the necessary rhythm”, Sainz completed. “With the amount of information that we have collected, these things should not happen”, summed up Verstappen, who next Sunday, in Saudi Arabia, will have the first opportunity to make amends.
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