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- 🏁 BONUS: Bahrain GP Recap
Ok I know what you’re thinking - is it Friday? Why am I being blessed (cursed?) with a special edition of PLP on a Monday? Did I unknowingly jump into the future? Is time even real, or just a construct of the human mind? What is the meaning of life?
The explanation is actually much less existential. Put simply, I done goofed. As many noticed, I included the wrong PLP Premium link in the Friday edition. Consequently, I’ve decided to send the inaugural semi-weekly race summary out to everyone FO’ FREE!
If you’d like to continue to receive the Monday race recap edition and support the Pulse, you can upgrade here (I actually tested the link this time). If you’re all set on F1 updates once a week, no further action is required and we’ll catch up on Friday.
Alright, now let’s see what conclusions we can jump to after only 1 race 🔽
Podium
🥇 VER
🥈 PER
🥉 SAI
DNF: None. This is the first time in F1 history that all drivers finished the opening race of the season.
Full Results
Qualifying
Race
Race Rating
⭐️⭐️⭐️ out of 5
Not too much action honestly, but there were some exciting moments which we’ll cover. I may be generous with 3 stars, and one of them is likely due to F1-is-back-first-race-of-the-season excitement. Also we have no others yet to compare it to so we’ll see how this ages as we get further into the year.
Driver of the Day
Carlos showed better place the teammate Charles (who to be fair, was struggling with a sizeable braking issue most of the race) put in an excellent drive to take P3 behind the Red Bulls. He kept pace with Perez in the last stint as they were on tire driver strategies (though it’s possible Sergio was trying to just maintain the gap and not push too hard). Either way it’s a great start for Sainz who is looking to impress possible suitors for 2025.
Race Highlights
Lap 1: Hulkenberg makes contact with Stroll, spinning him out and dropping them both down the order. Lance was able to fight back into the points, but this ruined Nico’s race.
Lap 3: Lando passes Alonso (as the McLaren’s would continue to do, with Piastri a lap later) + Russell moves up to 2nd at the expense of Leclerc
Lap 7: Perez passes the struggling Leclerc and moves into P3
Lap 11: Sainz with a great move on his teammate
Lap 17: Sainz with a lunge down the inside on his teammate (x2), after falling behind after his first pit stop
Lap 18: Guess who? Sainz again with a move on Russell to move into P3
Lap 32: A minute long pitstop ruins Bottas’ race. A mechanic could be seen delivering a tire nut to a lost-looking gun guy. Seems important.
Lap 46: Leclerc’s car comes alive as Russell’s falters, with the Ferrari passing the Mercedes and moving into P4
Lap 52: RB team orders a driver swap of Yuki and Daniel, Yuki responds “Are you kidding me, now?” With the result pretty much locked in at this point, this drama was the biggest action. Yuki was NOT happy, made quite obvious through his team radio. He took some time but finally made the swap.
Cool down lap: A frustrated Yuki dives to the inside on Ricciardo, locks up, and nearly makes contact as he speeds ahead of him again. A frustrated Ricciardo on the radio, “What the ****? I’ll save it - he’s a ******* helmet”. Helmet - British slang - used to describe an individual who’s being stupid or has completely no reputation to join a conversation or add their opinion. This was a fun one to learn.
Catch the full highlights here
What We Learned
Ferrari had the most improved lap time vs the 2023 Bahrain GP
Verstappen had a .41s average advantage per lap on Checo
McLaren and Mercedes were super tight, with just .08s per lap difference between the four drivers
📸 @FDataAnalysis on X
Verstappen now has points in 42 straight races. Wow
Leclerc was unlucky again, with engine failure in the season opener last year
Kick Sauber and Haas were quicker than expected. Ok, so formula1.com lists the two new teams as “Kick Sauber”, formerly referenced as Stake F1 team here, and “RB” formerly referenced as VCARB here. It’s confusing for me, too. But those are the officially listed names so we’ll stick with those here on out.
Alpine is way off the pace, and is slowest by far
The race finished roughly representing the current pace pecking order: 1. Red Bull 2. Ferrari 3. McLaren 4. Mercedes 5. Aston Martin 6. RB 7. Kick Sauber 8. Haas 9. Williams 10. Alpine
📸 @Big_Data_Master on X
Good Day / Bad Day
🟢 Red Bull Drivers: 20+ second win for Max, Checo P2. Dominant.
🔴 Yuki Tsunoda: No driver likes a swap order, but he showed some immaturity with how he handled it - at a time when some thought he’d turned a corner with controlling his emotions
🟢 Carlos Sainz: Podium, had the best on track highlights, driver of the day. Vamos!
🔴 Logan Sargeant: Not the start he wanted, finished 2 laps down. The pressure will only ramp up from here.
🟢 Zhou Guanyu: Solid result, just outside the points in P11
🔴 Alpine Drivers: The car just isn’t there. It’s going to be painful until they can bring upgrades
🟢 Lance Stroll: A great recovery drive to P9 after getting spun down to P19 at the start
Team Takeaways
🥇Red Bull: Right where they left off on track. Max dominated, winning by 22 seconds. Great start for Checo, who needed to take down P2 to squash the demons from last year. Off track however… wow it’s getting ugly. But more on that Friday..
🥈Ferrari: Probably the best result they could have hoped for this race, with Carlos taking a podium and Leclerc in P4. Charles was plagued by a brake issue, so taking 12 points was pretty good considering. Carlos passing his teammate twice was some of the best action of the day. A really hot start in his last Ferrari season, clearly on a mission to try to prove they’ve made a mistake by letting him go.
🥉Mercedes: They were hoping for more here, with a poor Qualifying from Hamilton who was able to squeeze out a P7. Russell looked good early on, holding onto P3 until he started having engine trouble - which he had to manage carefully and was overtaken by Sainz.
4️⃣ McLaren: Norris was disappointed with qualifying, and he ran a mostly uneventful race to take P6. Same story for Piastri, who held onto P8. It’s not like last year because they certainly aren’t the 2nd fastest team, though both drivers were able to pass Alonso - so they’ve got the advantage over Aston at the moment.
5️⃣ Aston Martin: Very clearly 5th fastest right now, taking P9 and P10. Alonso displayed his racecraft by not fighting early and pitting late, trying to make up places. He actually kept pace with Max in his last stint, though it wasn’t enough to score more than 2 points. Lance actually had a good recovery drive after his first lap incident, fighting his way back into the points.
6️⃣ Kick Sauber: Pace was decent, with Zhou putting in a solid race to take P11. Bottas got no help with an almost minute long pit stop due to a tire issue. Otherwise they look to have taken a step since last year. It’s the green paint, I’m telling ya.
7️⃣ Haas: They’ve got to be happy with this weekend. The car was better than expected, and Hulkenberg did what he’s been known to do and made it to Q3. The unfortunate contact with Stroll on lap 1 ruined his race - but K-Mag held off the RBs at the end to take P12.
8️⃣ RB: Danny was right to temper expectations, but it’s clear they are right in the thick of the midfield this year. With not too much race action, the intra-team drama here was one of the biggest stories to come out of this race. They’ll have to sort that out quickly. And honestly it just wasn’t a great look for Yuki.. he had a right to be mad but did not handle it well.
9️⃣ Williams: A disappointing race for Sargeant, spinning off track and finishing the race P20, 2 laps down. Not the way he wanted to start. Albon did what he could, but after one race it’s looking like the car just isn’t there at the moment.
🔟 Alpine: They knew they’d be slow to start the season, but boy they were slow. P19/P20 in Qualifying. They’ll have to develop aggressively, but with rumblings of key departures from the tech team.. who knows how that goes. More to come on that Friday as the story develops.
1 down, 23 to go! Hoping for a few more on track fireworks next week in Jeddah.
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Let’s hope we don’t hit bingo below.. though I have a feeling…
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