The Formula One teams and drivers took part in the first of five back-to-back race weekends in the 2017 Formula One season. This time the Formula One circus was at the Bahrain International Circuit for the 2017 FORMULA 1 GULF AIR BAHRAIN GRAND PRIX.
The weekend started off on Friday with the Mercedes drivers setting the pace during the first free practice session, although they would not remain on top by the end of the session. Instead it was Sebastian Vettel who set the time to beat, with the two Red Bull cars following close behind. Kimi Räikkönen struggled with technical difficulties in his Ferrari, stopping after just six laps. Felipe Massa also packed his bags early after a spin, as did Stoffel Vandoorne for a mechanical issue on his Honda power unit. The two Mercedes drivers were quite slow in the opening session, with Lewis Hamilton barely holding on to a top ten time. He was a full two seconds off of Vettel’s leading time.
Vettel was able to again claim the top time in the second free practice session, although it wasn’t without a scare when he car completely shut down during the session. The car was driven back to the garage and was repaired. Safety concerns regarding the new T-wings were raised after the session, following an incident where Valtteri Bottas’ wing flew off during the session. Despite this, Bottas was able to finish the day second fastest, with Daniel Ricciardo also coming within 0.066s of Vettel’s fastest lap.
Despite some complaints about the car gearbox, Max Verstappen was able to throw the Ferrari of Vettel off of the top of the leaderboard Saturday afternoon. The session saw a brief red flag period for Romain Grosjean, who had hit the wall after complaining about both understeer and oversteer. It was not a good session for the Frenchman, as he complained of a lack of power when the car returned to the circuit. Hamilton, Vettel, Bottas and Räikkönen finished behind the Red Bull of Verstappen, with less than a second covering the top eight drivers.
Saturday evening was a career milestone for Bottas, as he scored his first Formula One pole position during qualifying. The battle for pole position was tense, with Hamilton having topped the first two qualifying sessions of the evening. Bottas took pole by less than half a second from Hamilton. There was plenty of drama to fill the session. Fernando Alonso failed to set a time during Q2 due to engine issues, perhaps showing him that he made the right decision to skip Monaco for the Indianapolis 500 in May. Williams’ gamble to leave Massa in the garage with a comfortable P7 time did not pay off, as the Brazilian was overtaken by Nico Hülkenberg. With the Mercedes cars locking out the front row of the grid, Vettel shared row two with Ricciardo, while Räikkönen started the race alongside Verstappen.
There was drama before the formation lap on Sunday, as Vandoorne found himself locked in the garage with a mechanical issue, leaving just one McLaren to take part in the race. All of the top drivers got a good start off of the line, but Vettel’s start was slightly better than Hamilton’s allowing him to overtake the Brit. Bottas was able to stay ahead of the Ferrari. The two Red Bull cars got rather close as they battled for position and other drivers further down the field were three wide at times. Jolyon Palmer made a spectacular overtake on the Force India of Esteban Ocon, diving to the inside. Daniil Kvyat was the only driver to have any issues on the first lap, running wide but having the skill to recover. After the first lap it was Hamilton chasing Vettel chasing the race leader Bottas. The top five were able to pull away from the cars behind. Kevin Magnussen’s race came to an end just shy of ten laps into the race, pulling over to the side of the circuit with a mechanical issue. Vettel was the first of the top five to pit for tyres, trying to get the undercut on Bottas. Verstappen tried the same the following lap, but it was short lived when a brake failure sent his car straight on into the barrier.
The safety car was brought out when Carlos Sainz and Lance Stroll collided in the first corner. Sainz was exiting the pit lane on the inside of Stroll and the duo came together. The safety car prompted a lot of pit stops, with Mercedes double stacking for tyres. Hamilton was placed under investigation after his pit stop for slowing Ricciardo on the entrance into the pit lane. The incident eventually resulted in a five second penalty. The undercut for Ferrari paid off, as Vettel found himself leading behind the safety car. Hamilton was able to shoot past Ricciardo on the restart. Ricciardo began dropping down the field, with Massa and Räikkönen also sneaking by. Vettel and Bottas had a close battle in the first few sequence of corners, but Vettel was able to maintain his lead in the wheel-to-wheel battle. After hearing of the penalty, Mercedes ordered the driver swap, although Bottas had pulled too far ahead for Hamilton to catch him. On lap 27, Bottas slowed to let Hamilton pass by, allowing the Brit to chase down the race leader.
Bottas pitted for soft tyres with about 25 laps remaining in the race. Vettel did the same roughly five laps later, coming out of the pits ahead of Ricciardo and behind Räikkönen. This left Hamilton with a 15 second lead to Räikkönen. On the fresher tyres, Vettel was lapping more than a second a lap faster than the leading Mercedes, forcing Hamilton to take a pit stop and serve his five second penalty. He came out in third behind Bottas. However, Hamilton was easily able to close the gap to the guys in front with about a second per lap advantage. With ten laps remaining in the race, Hamilton and Bottas swapped positions in a nearly flawless move. At that point, Vettel began to reach the backmarkers at the rear of the field. Vettel was able to overtake Jolyon Palmer and Marcus Ericsson. Ericsson made Hamilton’s job slightly easier, pulling over with a mechanical failure ahead of Hamilton. However, with Vettel passing more cars and Hamilton losing time, the chance for the Mercedes race victory faded away. Vettel took the race victory, with Hamilton and Bottas completing the podium.
With the third round in the 2017 Formula One season now completed, things are beginning to heat up in the chase for the World Drivers’ Championship. The teams will get a week to recover from this weekend’s back-to-back Grand Prix. After that the teams will be in Russia for the 2017 FORMULA 1 VTB RUSSIAN GRAND PRIX on the weekend of April 30.
