Welcome To The 2024 Formula 1 Season

1. Welcome To Formula 1 In 2024 - The Bahrain Grand Prix Formula 1 is back! What better way to start my new blog than talking about the first race of the year, the Bahrain Grand Prix 2024? With plenty of drama, overtakes and car problems, the year's first race was one to remember! Lights Out And Away We Go! With Max Verstappen on pole, followed by Charles Leclerc and George Russell, we were ready to finally get racing! Quick off the line, Verstappen got a great start, fending off Leclerc into turn 1, and getting himself into the clean air. Behind him, Sergio Perez had managed to gain a position by overtaking Carlo Sainz, leaving the second Red Bull driver in 4th. Further down the field, there were problems at the back of the grid. Hulkenberg in Haas had gone into the back of Lance Stroll’s Aston Martin, which meant that Hulkenberg was left with front wing damage, and on the following lap, he pitted for an early stop to replace his soft tyres with hards and a new front nose. Lance Stroll fell to the back of the grid due to being spun out. The Early Stages Of The Race Whilst Russell was getting ahead of Lecelrec with the use of DRS and a big lock-up from the Monegasque driver, Verstappen was building himself a nice gap between him and the rest of the pack, by lap 6, Max already had 4 seconds between himself and Russell. Also worth noting, Mclaren had clawed their way into sixth and seventh.

2. Charles seemed to be having ongoing issues with his breaks, locking up almost every lap at turns 9 and 10, which, by lap 10, allowed Sergio Perez to get himself into the final podium position. Meanwhile, with his teammate only just ahead of him, Carlos Sainz was heard over the team radio, telling his Ferrari engineers that he had more pace than the drivers ahead of him. Sainz proved this when just a couple of laps later, after Logan Sargeant had a small slip-up which left him off of the track for a brief moment, the Spaniard managed to pass his teammate, in a stunning move down the inside, and was sent on the hunt for that final podium position. To The Pits! Due to all 20 drivers beginning the race on soft tyres, the pit window opened as early as lap 12 for George Russell and Charles Leclerc, both drivers opting for hard compound tyres. As did Perez, Piastri, and Hamilton who responded to the front runners. Out in the lead, Max Verstappen and Carlos Sainz stayed out for a few more laps, making the most of their fast soft tyres. Sainz eventually pitted on lap 15, cutting it close on the pit exit with his teammate, by nearly going into the back of him. Charles also had a moment with one of the Kick Sauber cars. Throughout the pit stop window, Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton were on the radio to their respective teams complaining about car issues. The Ferrari driver was still experiencing issues with his brakes, even on the hard compound tyre, and was still locking up all around the track. Hamilton was concerned that his battery was dying, leaving with him very little power. The last three drivers to pit were Alono, Albon on lap 16, and front-runner Verstappen on lap 17, all pitting for hard tyres. By this point, Verstappen had built up such a lead, that he managed to complete his stop and still come out ahead of his teammate, who was still running in second. Sainz had raced up to third, by overtaking his teammate for the second time in the race, this time by being bold with late-breaking, and he also managed to sweep around the outside of Russell, leaving the Spaniard in the final podium position for now. Driver Issues Drivers having issues seemed to be a common theme throughout this race. Perez was struggling to hear his team over their radio. Hamilton, who had been experiencing battery issues throughout the race, was now complaining that his seat had broken. Further down the grid, Albon was having issues with the new steering wheel that Williams had introduced for the 2024 season. Any time Albon was in the dirty air, his steering wheel would inform him that the car was “too hot”. Kick Sauber had a nightmare when Valterri Bottas came in for his second pit stop and was stationary for 52 seconds! He had issues with a wheel nut on his front left tyre. This horrible stop sent him tumbling down the order, coming out in front of only Logan Sargent after his incident earlier in the race.

3. Second Time Lucky George Russell was the first of the front runners to make his second pit stop, opting for the hard compound tyres once again. He rejoined behind the Aston Martin of Fernando Alonso, but only for a brief moment, with the Mercedes quickly overtaking with the help of DRS down the main straight. Norris, Leclerc, Hamilton and Piastri also came in for their second stops, all using a fresh set of the hard tyres, after successful second stints on them. Piastri and Hamilton, who pitted one lap differently from each other, had a bit of a moment when Piastri came out of the pits side to side with the 7x World Champion. The papaya car had his nose ahead into turn one, but as new hard tyres hadn’t warmed up yet, he slid off the track at the exit, and Hamilton flew through. Soft vs Hard One thing that set the Red Bull family apart from the grid was that after their second pit stop, Verstappen, Perez and Ricciardo, racing for RB, went for soft compound tyres for their final stint. When Perez put on softs, he still had 20 laps of the race to go. That was very ambitious for the Mexican driver, considering most drivers were swapping their softs after just 12 laps on their first stint. This did however give hope to Carlos Sainz, who was chasing Perez for second. Technically, Sainz’s hard tyres should be coming into their own, just as Perez’s soft tyres would begin to wear away. However, the Mexican did a mighty job of managing his tyres and nursing them to the end of the race. Closing Stages In the closing stages of the race, Leclerc managed to get a hold of his issues and took advantage of a small mistake from Russell in Turn 10, making it Charles in 4th with Russell Behind in 5th, with Norris fast approaching behind him. Hulkenberg, Gasly, and Sargent all took a gamble on a late pitstop, putting on the soft tyres in an attempt to gain some positions. Although their pace had improved, it was too little too late for the drivers, and they just couldn't climb into the point positions this time. There was some drama for the RBs (formerly Alpha Tauri) in the latter stages of the race. With Ricciardo on softs and Tsunda on the hard compound, the team made the call for Ricciardo to overtake Tsunoda in an attempt to gain some positions by overtaking Kevin Magnussen in a Haas just in front of the Bulls. Tsunoda was not happy about this, as shown through some heated exchanges with his radio engineer. There was even some reckless driving after the chequered flag. When asked about this, Ricciardo labelled it as “immaturity”. Under The Chequered Flag Starting the year as he meant to go on, Verstappen finished in first, a whopping 22 seconds ahead of his teammate, Sergio Perez in second, and Carlos Sainz in third, with his Ferrari teammate, Charles Leclerc a further 15 seconds behind them. This meant the race finished with RedBill 1-2 and Ferrari 3-4.

4. Here’s how the full grid finished: RED BULL RACING HONDA RBPT 1 Max Verstappen 1:31:44.742 RED BULL RACING HONDA RBPT 2 Sergio Perez +22.457s 3 Carlos Sainz FERRARI +25.110s 4 Charles Leclerc FERRARI +39.669s 5 George Russell MERCEDES +46.788s 6 Lando Norris MCLAREN MERCEDES +48.458s 7 Lewis Hamilton MERCEDES +50.324s 8 Oscar Piastri MCLAREN MERCEDES +56.082s Fernando Alonso ASTON MARTIN ARAMCO MERCEDES 9 +74.887s

5. ASTON MARTIN ARAMCO MERCEDES 10 Lance Stroll +93.216s KICK SAUBER FERRARI 11 Zhou Guanyu +1 lap Kevin Magnussen 12 HAAS FERRARI +1 lap 13 Daniel Ricciardo RB HONDA RBPT +1 lap 14 Yuki Tsunoda RB HONDA RBPT +1 lap 15 Alexander Albon WILLIAMS MERCEDES +1 lap 16 Nico Hulkenberg HAAS FERRARI +1 lap 17 Esteban Ocon ALPINE RENAULT +1 lap 18 Pierre Gasly ALPINE RENAULT +1 lap KICK SAUBER FERRARI 19 Valtteri Bottas +1 lap

6. 20 Logan Sargeant WILLIAMS MERCEDES +2 laps Our next outing is in Saudi Arabia, at the Jeddah street circuit. Will Max continue his winning streak? Or will we see somebody else victorious? His teammate is notoriously famous for being a master of street circuits. We will soon find out on the 9th of March. Written by Gareth Booth