2024 Formula 1 Bahrain Grand Prix Highlights

Max Verstappen has begun his title defence in style by taking victory in the 2024 Formula 1 Bahrain Grand Prix, while plenty of drama unfolded behind. He led home Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez and Ferrari rival Carlos Sainz to start his latest title defence in perfect fashion.

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Mario Isola, Motorsport Director, Pirelli:

The first Grand Prix of 2024 seemed almost like an extension to the previous season with Verstappen easily leaving the rest of the field in his wake, while it was all very close behind him. It’s no coincidence that there were five teams in the ten points-scoring positions, pretty much in the same order as they finished last season, the only exception being Ferrari ahead of Mercedes. In terms of how the tyres performed, there were no surprises: in fact the tyres are practically the same as those from last year’s race here and the three days of testing prior to this race meant the teams were able to analyse every aspect of their performance. The slightly cooler temperatures meant the Soft was even more competitive because there was less degradation, taking into consideration the nature of the track. However, only Red Bull made a bold choice in terms of strategy, while the others preferred to play it safe, keeping two sets of Hard for the race.

How the race was won from the tyre point of view:

Could there be a better way to start the season than with a Grand Chelem? That’s exactly what Max Verstappen did at the Bahrain Grand Prix, with a dominant performance that saw him not only win the race, but also take pole position, as well leading each and every one of the 57 laps. The Dutchman also secured the point that goes with setting the fastest race lap, a stratospheric 1’32”608 on lap 39, a full second and a half quicker than the second-best time of 1’34”090 set by Charles Leclerc. Max was joined on the podium by second placed Sergio Perez and Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz, third.

This was Verstappen’s 55th career win, while today’s Grand Chelem was his fifth, which puts him third for this particular discipline equal with Alberto Ascari and Michael Schumacher: ahead of him are Lewis Hamilton (6) and Jim Clark (8). As for Red Bull, it now joins Williams in fourth place on the list of team race wins on 114.

The Day on Track

In terms of tyre use and strategy, the race panned out pretty much as expected from earlier forecasts and simulations carried out after qualifying. All the drivers started on Soft tyres before switching to Hards. Those, such as Red Bull, who only had one available set of C1s, used the new set of C3s saved from qualifying for the final stint, while the vast majority of drivers opted for the second set of Hards for the third and last part. The exceptions can be counted on the finger of one hand: the quartet in question were Nico Hulkenberg, forced to pit on the opening lap following a collision at the start, making three stops, as did Pierre Gasly (Alpine) and Logan Sargeant (Williams.) They went for something different, doing two stints on the Hard and two on the Soft, while Daniel Ricciardo (Racing Bulls) made two stops, choosing a new C3 set to end the race.

What’s next?

Formula 1 is back on track almost immediately this coming week for the second round of the season, the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, from 7 to 9 March on the Jeddah street circuit. As was the case here in Bahrain, the race takes place on Saturday. Pirelli is bringing the C2, C3 and C4 compounds to Saudi Arabia, with Formula 2 again on the support card, while also racing for the first time this year will be the F1 Academy, the all-women series for which Pirelli is the sole tyre supplier.

2024 Formula 1 Bahrain Grand Prix Race Results

2024 Constructor Standings

Here are the team-by-team highlights:

Max Verstappen started the defence of his FIA Formula One World Championship title with victory in the Bahrain Grand Prix 2024 season opener on Saturday as Mexican teammate Sergio Pérez made it an Oracle Red Bull Racing 1-2 around the Sakhir circuit.

After the first round of pit stops, Verstappen – starting on pole – held a 5.458s lead over teammate Pérez, with Visa Cash App RB F1 Team’s Yuki Tsunoda back in 11th place after 19 laps and Australian teammate Daniel Ricciardo battling it out in a close group back in 16th place.

Max Verstappen, Driver, Red Bull Racing

It was a special one today. These kind of days don’t happen that often where the car feels spot on, including the balance and feeling of the car and everything went really well. The start was good and then we also looked after the car really well, so it was an enjoyable race for me. We managed to find a good rhythm and pace on this track and the wind strength and direction helped me extract a bit more from the car. This is one of our strongest circuits and looking to Jeddah we know that the track there is very different, with a lot of high speed corners and less degradation. I am hoping we can bring the same performance to next week: it’s going to be a challenge but I am looking forward to it. We have to thank everyone at the factory who has contributed to a great start to the year. It is always a big challenge to build a new car and follow up such an unbelievable season, but I’m excited to kick things off this season with a win.

Sergio Pérez, Driver, Red Bull Racing:

It was a really strong race from the Team, it’s a great start to the season, you can’t get better than a one-two to start a year which looks like it’ll be a really tight battle. I overtook Carlos at the start and from there we were able to chip away at things. There were a few issues that we need to iron out, but it is just important to keep the momentum with us now. From my side it is good to have a full race distance behind us now because there will be a lot of learning to do on how we manage tyres, how we push and then we can go from there. We had a good pace, but I think it is going to be track-dependent. I just want to keep improving because the season is long.

JODY EGGINTON – Technical Director, Red Bull Racing

A frustrating race in many ways. We need to go through the data and review points in the race where we could have maybe taken advantage of our closest competitors. Daniel was struggling a bit with his car balance in the first couple of stints, and we need to understand the factors influencing this. Daniel did make good use of his soft compound tyre in the final stint to get himself back to the group, but overtaking was not easy, and he ran out of laps to move forward. Yuki’s car balance was better and his pace was looking pretty reasonable in the first phases of the race, running well in the middle group and looking after his tyres quite well. However, we need to review in detail the middle phase of the race, including how Lance (Stroll) and Zhou (Guanyu) took advantage in the laps following the last round of stops. This cost some track positions, which we could not recover in the final part of the race, in this way missing the opportunity to fight for 10th place. In summary, the weekend has been solid, with the package able to perform reasonably well in the midfield battle, but we can’t help thinking we have not managed to extract everything from tonight’s race, so we leave Bahrain disappointed. There is a lot of work to do between now and next week’s race in Saudi Arabia, but at the same time, with it being so soon, we also have the opportunity to react and apply our learning from this event quickly.

Scuderia Ferrari got its season underway at the 2024 Formula 1 Bahrain Grand Prix with a third place for Carlos Sainz and a fourth for Charles Leclerc. The team got the best result possible given the hierarchy seen on track today. Compared to one year ago, the gap to the front has come down, and the SF-24 showed that, in its current form, it’s a good starting point.

The race. Charles kept second place off the line, while Carlos dropped to fifth as Sergio Perez got ahead of him. However, the Monegasque immediately ran into problems with the brakes, which meant he found it difficult to keep up with Perez and George Russell ahead of him. Carlos also got ahead of Leclerc, after which the Spaniard was able to match the pace of the Red Bull and the Mercedes thanks to great tyre management. Charles was called in on lap 11 in the hope the team could help his race, while Sainz stayed out until lap 14. On the Hards, the Spaniard was immediately very quick, to the extent he again passed his team-mate on lap 18 and Russell next time round, before setting off in pursuit of Perez.

Gradually, Charles found a way to deal with his braking difficulties, driving around the problem so that he too caught up with Russell, having pitted a second time for a new set of Hard tyres. The Ferrari caught the Mercedes on lap 42 and put Russell under pressure, forcing him into an error at turn ten on lap 47, which allowed Charles to snatch fourth place behind his team-mate. Sainz took the flag less than three seconds behind Perez, which was the very best result he could have hoped for. Indeed, his spectacular passing moves earned him the Driver of the Day award, as voted for by the general public.

Straight back on track. The Formula 1 World Championship is pressing on at pace, with the teams all heading straight to Saudi Arabia for the second race of the season next Saturday. The Jeddah Corniche circuit will present the SF-24 with a very different challenge on a track featuring close walls, long straights and high-speed corners.

Carlos Sainz #55

It’s a solid start to the season and very good points for the team. I felt really good in the car all race long, being able to control the pace and doing good overtakes. I tried everything to manage the tyres on the last stint to try and attack Checo (Perez) at the end of the race, but they were still faster than us. However, I think we have a very good baseline to work on, and we need to keep pushing to close the gap.
On to Jeddah!

Charles Leclerc #16

It was a disappointing race from my side. There was an issue with the brakes, so I struggled to stay on track, especially in turns 9 and 10. We would have had the pace in the car to put up a good fight, so I can’t wait to get back in the car in Jeddah.

Frédéric Vasseur – Team Principal

We were hoping for a better result but we had a brake issue during the race with Charles, so all in all we maximized the result on track today. Carlos had a good race with a very smart comeback after not getting a perfect start, and he was able to fight with Perez until the final stages. We knew we would have been on the Hard tyre and Checo would have been on Softs and our aim was to put the Red Bull under pressure, which we did towards the end but it was not enough.

Charles struggled for the entire race with the brakes and because of that in the first stint flat-spotted his tyres so we had to pit him earlier than planned. We will have to investigate why the brakes were not at the correct temperature.

This weekend, our flying lap performance matched our expectations, but we have a clear step to make in terms of our race pace as we were not in the fight with Red Bull. That said, I consider today’s race a good baseline as we were able to close the gap considerably compared to last year. We will continue with our development and I’m confident we will be able to take the fight to them more often.

George Russell finished fifth, and Lewis Hamilton seventh in the 2024 Formula 1 Bahrain Grand Prix. Both drivers had to manage overheating power units caused by a sub-optimal cooling configuration for the conditions.

George and Lewis battled gamely despite the forced pace limitations to ensure both cars finished in the points. In the first stint George and Lewis made initial forward progress, overtaking Leclerc and Alonso respectively to run P2 and P8 early on. As the race progressed, though, it became clear that the team wouldn’t have the pace to battle for the podium spots. Both Ferraris ultimately passed George, with Lewis splitting the McLarens of Norris and Piastri. The team will now review the weekend before heading to Saudi Arabia and Jeddah for round two of the 2024 season.

George Russell

It was a strange day today. Both Lewis and I faced a similar issue. The power unit was overheating from very early on, so we were managing that throughout. It was a shame as we made a really good start. I managed to make a good pass on Leclerc for second but very quickly, I had warnings on my steering wheel. To manage the overheating, we were losing tenths-of-a-second per lap, and it was very difficult to hold off anyone behind me. It’s a shame that we didn’t get to show any real potential for the car.

Thankfully, it’s not an issue we need to be concerned about. We got the cooling configuration wrong. We just need to understand why and make sure we don’t do that again. It was simply an incorrect decision; we’ve got plenty of margins to cool the power unit more. I think without the issue, we would have been in the fight for P3. It’s only the first race of the season, so let’s see what we can do next week.

Lewis Hamilton

It was a tough race today. For sure there is some disappointment within the team as we hoped that it would be a better evening. We were close with several other cars and the degradation was high. The issues we faced obviously cost us some pace, so that was frustrating.

Ultimately if I had qualified better, naturally I would have been a good couple of places further ahead as my last stint was good. Today was about discovery and we found out a lot about the car. There’s plenty of areas we can improve on and I’m sure we will as a team.

Toto Wolff, Team Principal & CEO

We got the cooling level wrong today, and that cost us. To manage the issue, we had to do a lot more lift and coast and you then lose performance with the tyres. It’s a vicious circle. We need to look at what we did wrong as we gave the drivers a car that was not competitive enough today. I’m keen to look at the data to make sure we don’t face similar changes in Saudi Arabia.

At the end of the day, though, we have a brand-new car, and we are learning about it. We have seen glimpses of performance here in Bahrain, but we couldn’t materialise that today. We will go away and make sure we build on our learning and come back stronger.

Andrew Shovlin, Trackside Engineering Director

The race proved an underwhelming and frustrating experience today. We were beset with overheating issues early on that we were forced to manage throughout the vast majority of the Grand Prix. The extra lift and cost the drivers were forced to do as a result of this also caused them to lose tyre temperature. They did their best to cope, with George trying valiantly to defend from those behind and Lewis chasing those ahead. Ultimately, P5 and P7 were likely the best we could do with the issues we were facing.

It was disappointing that we underperformed today. We will go away and review what we could have done differently. We will also look at our overall set-up as it was clear that neither driver was as happy with the balance of the car as they were over the rest of the weekend. These are all challenges of a new car, and we’re looking forward to coming back stronger in Jeddah next week.

Hear from McLaren Formula 1 drivers Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri, as well as Team Principal Andrea Stella, after the 2024 Formula 1 Bahrain Grand Prix.

Lando and Oscar hold thier positions off the start. On Lap 3, Norris makes a move on Alonso. Alonso out of DRS, giving Oscar an opportunity to get past him too. Oscar boxes from Softs to Hards, and Norris does the same on the following lap. The first set of stops shuffle out, leaving Lando P6 and Oscar P7. Both drivers have a solid stint before they pit again for fresh Hards. Oscar loses position to Hamilton exiting the pits, leaving him in P9 and Lando P7. Lando passes Alonso for P6, and a few laps later so does Hamilton and Oscar. Norris tries to hunt down P5 but doesn’t quite have enough. The chequered flag falls with Lando P6 and Oscar P8.

Lando Norris

It was a tough race, but I think we still had a good race with a good pace, and it was a definite improvement on last year, so I think we can be happy as a team. I think the wind hurt us a bit today. It changed a lot from the last few days, and it felt a lot worse in some corners, but we moved forward, and it was the best we could have hoped for today. A good start to the year.

Oscar Piastri

So, a P8 to start the year. I personally felt like it was a good race for me, and I think the race pace we had seemed ok. A few things to improve, but not a bad first race for us, especially when you look at where we were this time last year. I’m excited to see what the next few circuits have in store for us, and looking forward to seeing what we can do in the races to come.

Andrea Stella

It’s good to begin the season with a strong performance here in Bahrain. We’ve been reliable, we were quick enough to fight the Mercedes today, and this allowed us to score good points at a track we know isn’t the best for the characteristics of our car.

I would like to praise the work of the team at McLaren. They’ve consolidated the progress that we made last year and delivered an MCL38 which is a reliable and performing car. It’s a good foundation for the further improvements we plan to introduce as soon as possible.

Oscar and Lando drove very well and consistently this evening. They made no mistakes in tricky conditions, particularly on the Hard tyres, and got our team off to a good start in 2024.

Fernando and Lance achieved a double-point finish at the 2024 Formula 1 Bahrain Grand Prix as the season began at the Bahrain International Circuit, with Fernando crossing the line in ninth place and Lance following him home in 10th.

Saturday’s race provided a first opportunity to understand AMR24’s race pace relative to the field. The team will now analyse the data gathered from the 57-lap race, and build on its learnings at the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix in a week’s time.

Fernando Alonso

I’m happy to score some points from the race today, and it was probably where we expected to finish. It ended up being a bit of a quiet race for us, with a gap ahead and behind us. We thought we would stay out longer on both stints and hope there was an advantage to gain from a Safety Car, but it wasn’t to be.

I think we have some analysis to do on our one-lap pace against our race performance. I’m feeling confident that we can improve as the season progresses, and let’s see if we can be a bit stronger in Saudi Arabia next week.

Lance Stroll

It feels good to score a point after running last after the first lap of the race. I had a good getaway off the line but then got tagged by Nico [Hülkenberg] and fell to the back of the pack. I knew it would be a long race from there, but I focused on managing the tyres and made a few passes on the track. The team gave me a good strategy, too.

We know we’ve got some work to do as we develop the AMR24 and unlock some more pace, but it’s a long season, and we’ll keep pushing.

Mike Krack, Team Principal:

We completed our objective of getting both cars home in the points and that’s a good way to start the new season – so a big thank you to the entire team in Silverstone and trackside. We certainly optimised things this evening, considering our race pace and scoring points is a reward for the team’s hard work over the last few weeks. It was a brilliant recovery drive from Lance after being hit and spun around at the first corner.

The strategy for Fernando was designed to keep our options open in the event of Safety Cars. In the end, it was a straightforward race for him. We need a bit more performance to challenge the teams ahead, but this is one race, one track, and we will work hard over the coming days to make progress in Jeddah next weekend.

Stake F1 Team Kick Sauber delivered a strong race under the Sakhir floodlights, as it emerged as the sixth force of the championship in a tense 2024 Formula 1 Bahrain Grand Prix. In a race with no retirements, Zhou Guanyu climbed to 11th place, courtesy of a faultless performance, leading the midfield to the chequered flag.

Valtteri Bottas’s race was unlucky: a strong start off the line was in vain, as the Finn was an innocent part of the Turn One clash between Hülkenberg and Stroll. Despite the resulting front wing damage, Valtteri delivered a consistent race, only to suffer a cross-threaded nut at the pit stop, which ultimately put him in P19.

Valtteri Bottas

Unfortunately, today just hasn’t been my day. I had a good start, but then I got caught up in the Turn One incident between Nico [Hülkenberg] and Lance [Stroll], which resulted in front wing damage that made me lose some ground and performance. On top of that, we had an issue with the wheel nut during my second pit stop, which made us lose some more time. Luck wasn’t on our side today, but hopefully, that’s all the bad luck for this season. As a positive to take home with us, our pace was definitely better than that of our main competitors – as seen with Zhou, who nearly finished into the points. This shows we have a better race car than last season, and gives us confidence looking into Jeddah next week.

Zhou Guanyu

Today, we maximised everything we could, and I am happy we were able to fight so closely for the points. We had a clean race with a good start where I was able to make up some positions, but it was quite challenging to keep the Aston Martins behind without compromising our tyres. Luckily, I managed to keep Kevin [Magnussen] and the rest of the field behind me. We made progress over the weekend, and the team worked hard to find the optimal setup. Unfortunately, in a race with no attrition, we couldn’t get points without anything happening to the cars ahead of us. There is still a lot to improve for us, and we’ll continue working on our performance to be able to compete even more strongly for points in Jeddah and in the upcoming races.

Alessandro Alunni Bravi, Team Representative

We delivered a very consistent race today, and we demonstrated to be the sixth team in the championship in race conditions. This result must give our team confidence and encourage us: it is possible to take further steps and improve our performance. In particular, making progress in our single-lap performance, even before Jeddah, would give us a stronger chance to fight for the points.

Zhou drove a strong race tonight, making no mistakes and matching Stroll’s Aston Martin for most of the race, which is a very good sign for the season ahead. Unfortunately, Valtteri was unlucky as his good start came to nothing when he got caught in someone else’s accident at Turn One: he suffered damage to his front wing flap, and we saw the loss of performance that caused, which prevented him from fighting for higher positions. The problem in the pit stop, when he suffered a cross-threaded nut, put an end to any hope of recovery, but he was still able to deliver a strong final stint, which was a good reference for Zhou’s tyre management.

Even in these difficult conditions, we played as a team. I want to pay tribute to the team: after yesterday’s difficult qualifying, which did not reflect where we think we are in terms of overall performance, we made an improvement today, also thanks to both drivers’ performances. We now need to focus on the next step: we know the areas of our car we need to improve: if we keep working like we did in the last few weeks, there will be opportunities soon.

MoneyGram Haas F1 Team drivers Kevin Magnussen and Nico Hulkenberg placed 12th and 16th respectively at the 2024 Formula 1 Bahrain Grand Prix, Round 1 of the 2024 FIA Formula 1 World Championship.

Kevin Magnussen

Ayao Komatsu, Team Principal

Max Verstappen went on to bank a comfortable victory by 22.457s and claim the fastest lap to earn 26 points with 18 for Pérez in second as Ricciardo got past Tsunoda to finish in 13th and 14th place respectively at the finish.

Daniel Ricciardo

We were not quite good enough for points today. I struggled a lot at the beginning of the race with the used soft tyres because there was a pretty poor grip off the line. In the middle stint with the hard tyres, we got a little bit more pace, but I anyway felt that I was struggling. In the end, the new soft compound was a lot better. We finally extracted some pace and were catching the pack. At that point, I got a little stuck behind other cars and I lost the grip on the tyres. The call for the drivers’ swap was quite expected and came with no surprise. Before the race, we obviously talked with the team about strategy plans, and it was highly likely I was going to finish the race with a new set of soft tyres after starting the race with a used set. It is what it is, and let’s turn the page now. I’ve got an idea of what we can do to be better, so I’ve some confidence in going racing next week in Jeddah.

Yuki Tsunoda

I think I was doing quite well within the points until about halfway through the race when I felt it was slipping away from us. We weren’t fighting for points at that time, so we’ll have to review everything during our post-race analysis and learn from it for the future. It’s race one, so there’s still lots of time to understand. In general, there’s still a lot we can take away from this weekend. The mechanics did a great job with all our pitstops, and if there is anything we could do better strategy-wise, we’ll review and improve for Saudi.

Laurent Mekies – Team Principal

Overall, a tough Saturday where the midfield was tighter than ever. The fight for P11 was a hard one, with eight cars involved at times! In the early stage of the race, we felt we could have had a good go at it, with Yuki doing a good job and driving up to P10. We lost a few positions as the race went on and struggled to pass our competitors in the final stage of the race. We had Daniel on a new set of soft tyres for that final stint and we swapped our cars to give ourselves a chance to overtake Kevin (Magnussen) and Zhou (Guanyu) but ultimately it was not enough, and we had to settle for P13 and P14. We know that it is only race one, but we will certainly review how we could have extracted more from our car and our pace today. There are more positives than negatives in our first weekend as Visa Cash App RB and everyone is pushing very hard in Faenza and Bicester. Any hundredths of a second gained in the midfield is going to make a significant difference.

Alex Albon finished P15 with Logan Sargeant in P20 at the 2024 Formula 1 Bahrain Grand Prix.

Alex would pit once more and Logan twice, but the pair would have a quiet second half to proceedings, coming home an eventual P15 and P20.

Alex Albon

The car itself was okay, but we were far behind. We had issues the whole race with things that, if we had done more running in testing, we would’ve been able to avoid. We were overheating the entire race and were down on power, so hopefully, we can take a look at the data and arrive in Jeddah in better shape. Our pace relative to the others is quite similar, so that midfield battle is close and will be tough.

Logan Sargeant

It was frustrating as we had the steering wheel electronics issue yesterday in Qualifying and then it returned today. The most important thing is that we need to understand the root cause of this and get it fixed going forward. We had a really good first lap and a great opening stint and made some good gains and it felt like it was coming to me before we had the issue. We were struggling a little with PU temp which meant I couldn’t stay close to the cars ahead, so it was just a bit of a disappointing evening. There’s nothing we can’t fix, but we need to understand everything moving forward.

Dave Robson – Head of Vehicle Performance

We were dealing with issues on both cars from very early in the race and never really gave either driver an opportunity to push hard. In close traffic, we were running the PUs at their temperature limits, and we had to manage this carefully. Logan suffered from another electronic issue, which caused him to flat-spot his tyres and led to him changing the steering wheel at the pit stop. There are clearly issues that we need to rectify fully before next Saturday when we race in Jeddah. As we saw yesterday, the midfield is very tight and had we done a better job today, there was an opportunity to race for points. Fortunately, we have a chance to come back straight away, resolve the issues and race better in Saudi Arabia.

Esteban Ocon started from P19 on New Softs, finished P17: Pit-Stops on Lap 11 for New Hards, Lap 31 for New Hards. Fastest Lap: 1min 36.226secs.

Pierre Gasly started from P20 on New Softs, finished P18: Pit-Stops on Lap 13 for New Hards, Lap 32 for New Hards, Lap 46 for New Softs. Fastest Lap: 1min 34.805secs.

Esteban Ocon

Today was a continuation of what we saw in Qualifying yesterday and, overall, it has not been the weekend we wanted. Most importantly we had a clean race and collected valuable data that we can take into the race in Jeddah next week. It will be interesting to see how we fare on different layouts and in different conditions. We’ll dig in and put our heads together during the short break between races and see where we can improve. We have to stay focused, stay positive and keep going in the right direction. Collectively as a team we have to keep our heads up and foot down going to Saudi Arabia.

Pierre Gasly

It was not our day, but probably what we expected in the end. I had a great launch off the line, passed a couple of cars but then I was caught by some Turn 1 chaos with cars spinning in front, which put me back. That was not ideal, but after that, we did all we could do with what we had in our hands today. We have many areas to keep improving, and I know the hard work will continue behind the scenes. We have to keep making steps forward as we are not where we want to be right now. Next week it’s a different track, a new opportunity and a fresh challenge for us to keep showing progress.

Bruno Famin – Team Principal

We knew the start of the season was going to be difficult and that has been the case in Bahrain. That said, we are doing everything we can with what we have right now and we will keep finding improvements and making progress each time we are on track. Credit to the team and the drivers for their efforts here in Bahrain over the last couple of weeks. The togetherness of the team will shine through. Next week we go to Jeddah, a completely different track to Bahrain, which brings a new opportunity to keep learning and progressing our A524 package. The hard work will continue.