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ESPN staff
ESPN rounds up all the reaction from up and down the Sakhir paddock following the 2018 Bahrain Grand Prix.
Mercedes
Lewis Hamilton (3rd): « It was so close in the end, it’s a shame I couldn’t win. When it’s so close, you start to think about every lap and every corner after the race, trying to figure out if there is something you could have done better. But I feel like I did a good race, I didn’t make any mistakes and I gave it everything I had. I didn’t try the Medium tyres before the race, but it went well and we managed to do a really long stint. Only in the last three laps I started to struggle with the tyres and once I got close to Sebastian everything got more difficult. The pace today was better than expected so that we could put some pressure on Ferrari. It’s very close and it’s going to be an interesting season. We still have work to do, especially for conditions like here in Bahrain. I think we can see some positives, but the main thing for us is to really learn from this weekend. »
Valtteri Bottas (2nd): « It’s disappointing not to be in the first row. We’ve made some good progress through the weekend, but Ferrari was quicker today. We definitely have work to do at this type of circuits and in these kind of conditions. I think we have the right set-up of the car for the race, but it’s difficult to estimate the race pace. I think it’s going to be really closely matched between Ferrari, Red Bull and us, so it should be an interesting race. I learned a lot about tyre management last year at this track that I think I can use this year. We’ll definitely go for it tomorrow and hopefully Lewis can also come back to get some good points so we can keep the pressure on Ferrari. »
James Allison, technical director: « This is a Grand Prix that has to go down in the category of « one that got away ». But after a difficult qualifying session yesterday, it was encouraging to see our long run pace was extremely competitive, especially because this is what let us down so badly one year ago at this track. We cannot help but wonder what might have been for Valtteri given another lap on Sebastian’s tail, or indeed had Lewis started the race without the handicap of his gearbox penalty. But we must put those speculations behind us and head to China determined to claim our first win of the 2018 season. »
Ferrari
Sebastian Vettel (1st): « Obviously, this is a great way to start the season and it wasn’t expected. Obviously Australia was a different race and if you compare these two races, here we had the pace and won on our own. So, I think it’s been much better, but it was a very tough race. It took a while for the adrenaline to go, but for the next week we are not sure where we are going to be. It is difficult to predict with everything changing so much. In China it will be a different track and a different challenge, but we have to improve our car and work on it. We still need to improve the balance. However, if we should have a similar feeling like here, then I think we should be in a good shape. We were losing a little bit at the end and Bottas was getting closer. We couldn’t wait and see what he was doing. So, in response to that we had to come in first to protect the track as much as I could. We had targeted two stops and that’s why we had chosen Soft tires. But then we had to change strategy; the tires were already wearing out, but then it seemed everything was ok. But after 10 or 12 laps, the tires got worse and the last five laps were very tricky. It feels better winning here than in Australia, because here we had the pace. So, I am very happy, even though it’s sad to see one of our guys getting injured. I wish him to get well soon, I know he’s in very good hands now. »
Kimi Raikkonen (DNF): « What happened to our guy Francesco today at the pit-stop is very unfortunate. I feel sorry for him and hope he’s going to be OK soon. It’s always a bad thing when someone gets injured but I am sure he has the best people taking good care of him and I wish him a speedy recovery. As for the accident itself, all I know is that I moved when I saw the green light go on. I couldn’t have possibly realized that there was an issue with the rear left wheel, then I saw someone had got hurt and, immediately, I was told to stop by the team. Unfortunately something must have gone wrong and we’ll need to find out what. The car had good speed today but I had some wheelspin at the start. Anyway, there’s not much I can do now but wait for the next race, where we’ll try to do our best. »
Red Bull
Max Verstappen (DNF): « Due to the hit with Lewis we sustained some more severe damage than just the puncture, we haven’t had a chance to look at the car yet but we suspect the differential. From the start I was enjoying the feel of the car and finding the gaps and it was shaping up to be an exciting race. I had a good tow on the straight, the last corner was really good so it allowed me to stay close to Lewis. We got a bit squeezed but from the middle to the end of the corner I was ahead, I then felt a nudge from behind and could feel the puncture and therefore knew the race was likely over. In my opinion there was plenty of room for the both of us to go around that corner and to say ‘no action taken’ is a bit harsh as I am now out of the race due to that contact on my left rear. If it was the other way around I’m sure he would want it looked into. »
Daniel Ricciardo (DNF): « Coming in to turn eight I lost all power, everything switched off without warning and I couldn’t do anything. I guess it’s an electrical engine issue, maybe battery related but I don’t know exactly yet. Obviously, everyone in the team is so disappointed as we genuinely felt like we had a good car today. The weekend was going pretty good for us and I really believe our race car was even better. I know I only did one lap but I could already see Kimi sliding on the rear tyres. I really felt like we were going to be in with a good chance which makes it even more frustrating. Being out so early in a race is just the worst feeling; especially when it’s a night race and you are up all day waiting for those two hours and after two minutes it’s over. I get really fired up for Sundays so now I’ve got two hours of adrenaline stored up inside me and I don’t know what to do with it. This sport can rip your heart out, it’s brutal sometimes. »
Force India
Esteban Ocon (10th): « It was a very tough race and there was never really a chance to catch my breath. I was always pushing, always fighting, always chasing. We are right in the middle of the midfield fight and it was a nice reward to overtake Carlos [Sainz] with just two laps to go and score the final point. I’m a bit disappointed that we didn’t get more from this race, especially starting from eighth place, but we did the best we could in the circumstances. The main positive to take from this weekend is the improvement we made compared to Melbourne. We need to keep working in the same direction to find more performance in China next week. »
Sergio Perez (16th): « It feels like an opportunity lost because my race was effectively over on lap one. We knew how important it was to stay out of trouble, but there was nothing I could do to avoid what happened. I made a pretty good start, but Brendon [Hartley] lost control of his car and spun me around. I had a lot of damage to the floor and that cost me performance for the rest of the race. Despite that, I nearly made it back into the points, but in the end there was no chance to do it. We can look at some positives: it was a fun race, with lots of battles and we are making progress with the car. I hope we can continue the good work and be quicker in China, where we will hopefully get more performance from our package. »
Williams
Sergey Sirotkin (15th): « It’s not so easy to summarise the race. This was my first F1 race distance. It was a good experience, but we switched our plan. Our strategy was a two-stop, which we ended up sticking with and it was not optimum as I think we lost a bit of track time with that. Then I was caught by quite a lot of lapped cars, so again I lost quite a bit of track time. The pace was OK but we cannot follow other cars. It’s something we definitely need to improve. It’s a big problem on the first lap as it’s impossible to fight people without damaging the front tyre. However, as we said a few days ago, we’re just trying to get to the end of the race. I tried all the tyre compounds, so it was a good experience and I came up with some good pace on the last set, so it was a reasonable improvement. Now we go to China. »
Lance Stroll (14th): « I was really happy with my race, even though we were nowhere in terms of position. I had a really good start and picked up five positions, so I was happy about that. After that I touched the front wing fighting with Grosjean, so I had to box early and we lost 10 seconds as we had to change the front wing at the stop. But I managed to recover from that and beat my team mate at the end. I am obviously happy with the recovery we made after the first couple of laps. I still believe we did the maximum we could have done today. I hope we can be better in China, but behind the scenes there is a lot of work to be done. »
Paddy Lowe, chief technical officer: « It was not a great end to a very tough weekend for the team. We didn’t have the pace today to compete with any other cars except ourselves. We have clearly got to go away and look deeply into what has affected our pace, even relative to where we were in Melbourne just two weeks ago. We’ll see what we can do in the short time available between now and China next week. This is a time to stick together as a team and work intelligently and diligently on the problems we face. Finally, I hope the Ferrari mechanic is OK after the nasty looking incident in the pitstop during the race. »
Renault
Nico Hulkenberg (6th): « We got the maximum from the race today, which is a good positive. We didn’t quite have the pace to compete with the cars ahead of us and that leaves me a little disappointed, so it’s clear the midfield fight is very close. It was a busy race and our main focus was fuel saving whilst still trying to race other cars and I think we managed that quite well tonight. »
Carlos Sainz (11th): « I was surviving in the end there with very tired Soft tyres and having to do a lot of fuel saving. We need to analyse what happened at the start because I had too much wheel spin and from there onwards the race was compromised. I was stuck in traffic after both stops and we couldn’t really do a lot from there. It was a tough day to be honest, but luckily China is just around the corner and we will fight our way back to the points. »
Toro Rosso
Brendon Hartley (17th): « An amazing day for Toro Rosso but a disappointing day for me. I had a good start and first couple of corners but had a small contact with Perez in Turn 4. This not only damaged my front wing for the remainder of the race but I was also given a 10 second time penalty. We had the pace to be comfortably in the points without the penalty so it was a bit frustrating. A big thanks to all at Toro Rosso and at Honda, it has been an amazing turn around since Melbourne which bodes well for the next few races. »
Pierre Gasly (4th): « It was a very exciting race and it is satisfying to have seen both our cars perform well to take the chequered flag. Special congratulations must go to Pierre who drove brilliantly all weekend to finish 4th, to give Honda it’s highest finish since we returned to Formula 1 in 2015. Brendon drove very well to fight back from a 10 second penalty, but unfortunately it was enough to drop him out of the points. In the two weeks since our difficulties at the Australian Grand Prix, everyone in the team, at the track and back in the UK and Japan, has worked very hard and this nice result is a well-deserved reward for all our efforts. We feel we have made some progress, improving our reliability and it is also clear that the aero updates introduced here worked really well. We can enjoy this moment for a few hours, but as from tomorrow, it’s time to focus on the next round in Shanghai. »
Toyoharu Tanabe, Honda F1 Technical Director: « A strong performance from both drivers, with Pierre getting into Q3 and Brendon just missing out on the top ten by a tiny margin. The changes made to the aero package have certainly worked and this circuit seems to suit us better than Melbourne. All the sessions so far have gone smoothly from our side and that always helps. Today’s performance is a nice boost for the team – well done to everyone -and now we will ensure we are as well prepared as possible for tomorrow night’s race. »
Haas
Romain Grosjean (13th): « It was always going to be difficult starting from the back of the grid. I didn’t really have a good first lap, but after that I came back through the field quite nicely. If I hadn’t lost my bargeboard I’d have finished potentially seventh or eighth. That was a problem – losing parts as we’re just running on track. On those two laps, the car was absolutely undriveable. We had to pit to remove the part, so that was the end of the story. »
Kevin Magnussen (5th): « I’m happy about today. It’s really good to get 10 points and get our championship started. I’m really proud of the team, especially the guys on the pit stops. They had a tough time between Australia and here. They kept their heads and got back to basics. They did what they do best and they delivered today. I couldn’t really fight with Gasly in the Toro Rosso ahead in fourth, but still, we’re happy with P5. »
Guenther Steiner: « I’m pretty happy with fifth place. There were maybe a few points lost with Romain, who was going strong from 16th up to 10th, but then he needed an additional pit stop to clear off some parts of the car which had come loose. We have to investigate that to see if he went off or hit something at the start. All in all, it’s been a good weekend. The pit stops were good. We had five in the race and they were all good. I think the guys have recovered and I’m very proud of them, and they can be proud of themselves for what they’ve achieved this weekend. Coming back from two failed pit stops at the last race in Australia to take a fifth-place finish without a problem, it’s fantastic. »
McLaren
Stoffel Vandoorne (8th): « After the start of the race I didn’t think this result would be possible today! I had a terrible start, a lot of wheel-spin off the line and found myself sitting there in absolute last after Turn One. From there we made a great recovery, and to finish eighth and have both cars in the points again is very pleasing. We always knew our race pace was going to be better than our qualifying pace and today we proved that again. We overtook a lot of cars on track and made some very bold overtaking moves into Turn One. For me it was an amazing race and I enjoyed some great fighting, so I’m pretty happy. We were very ambitious today and had a good strategy, knew our race pace was better than a lot of the people around us and today is a great result for us. We still have a lot of analysis and work to do to understand why our race pace is so different. I think it will get better over the next few races and if we’re able to start in higher positions it will make our life a bit easier and allow us to finish further up the grid. I’m sure the results will be visible very soon. There are a lot of plans in place and we know that in Formula 1 it can take a bit of time to see the benefits of those, but we’re very confident that on a Sunday we can go out and race. We showed that again today and we need to keep working and keep improving. »
Fernando Alonso (7th): « It was another great race today, with the team performing good pit-stops, good strategy and good reliability. Everyone worked perfectly today and we got both cars into the points. We did a good job at the start, overtaking a couple of cars. We had newer tyres compared to the people around us and we were expecting a bit more, but after that we had the pace to keep our position in the front train. Looking at the overall picture of the weekend, we struggled in every session and had quite a poor qualifying, so now being seventh and eighth is a positive result for the team. Having 16 points after two races is promising, but at the same time we know that this weekend was not good enough in terms of performance, so we need to raise our game. We just cannot underperform again. We know that we have the potential, and that the car has some good things and bad things which we need to make sure we improve as soon as possible. New parts are coming, but whatever we have on the car on Sunday we’re sure we’ll deliver and push to the limits, and today was another good example. »
Eric Boullier, McLaren racing director: « After a tough day for us yesterday, a double-points finish is a pleasing reward for the hard work the whole team put in overnight to ready our cars for today’s race. We knew that our race pace would be stronger than our qualifying performance, but in such a tight midfield it’s often too close to predict and anything can happen to affect the order. While we did benefit from certain circumstances in the race, we showed good pace and deployed a strong strategy to gain track position at every opportunity. Both drivers did an incredible job – managing their tyres and fuel, regulating their pace, and reading the situation around them to maximise their track positions. Fernando drove masterfully to keep on top of the pack and attack cars further ahead, making great progress against our nearest competition to finish seventh. Stoffel, after suffering at the start and exiting the first corner last, made an impressive fightback through the field. Although most of them weren’t seen on our screens, he made no fewer than 11 on-track overtakes over the course of the race, to finish just behind his team-mate in eighth place. Congratulations to both of them for today’s excellent performances – their double-points finish is thoroughly deserved. I’d also like to say a massive well done to our mechanics for their excellent work in the pit-stops today, which really helped us to execute our strategy perfectly. Now we must keep our heads down, keep working hard, and first and foremost turn our attention to our qualifying performance to make an improvement in China in a few days’ time. Finally, we send our thoughts and best wishes to the Ferrari mechanic, and we hope he makes a speedy recovery. »
Sauber
Charles Leclerc (12th): « It has been a motivating evening for the team. After working hard all weekend, we scored two points, with Marcus having a very strong race. At the same time, I am not completely satisfied with my own result. We went for a high-risk strategy after I struggled with a flat-spot at the beginning of the race. We opted for a set of medium tyres – unfortunately, they did not last as long as we hoped. We are looking into what happened in the stint on the medium option and will be sure to learn from this experience. In any case, it was a positive race for the team, and I look forward to being back in the car next weekend in China. »
Marcus Ericsson (9th): « It is an amazing feeling to back in the points, especially this early into the season, as a start to our new chapter with Alfa Romeo. It is a great reward to everyone at the racetrack and back at the factory. The strategy we had today was good, and it was a challenge to make it all the way to the end of the race with the tyres and fuel we had. I had to be clever as a driver and pick the right fights to make sure that I do not use the tyres too much. It was a great team effort. I am very happy, very pleased, and I look forward to continuing on this positive path. »
Pirelli
Mario Isola, head of car racing: « This was an absolutely thrilling and absorbing race, which delivered exactly what we hoped with this latest generation of tyres: many different strategies, close racing and an exciting finish with some of the best drivers in the world battling each other down to the final corner. Tyre management was absolutely key to Vettel’s victory, with the Ferrari driver making a new set of soft tyres last for 39 laps, which we never saw before here during the weekend. Mercedes also made a one-stop strategy work by putting two cars on the podium when a two-stopper was theoretically quicker: this decision altered the entire complexion of the race and made for a thrilling conclusion. Congratulations also to Pierre Gasly and Toro Rosso, and our best wishes for a speedy recovery to the Ferrari mechanic who was injured during their pit stop. »
http://www.espn.com/f1/story/_/id/23080180/who-said-bahrain-grand-prix
