Red Bull tipped to run and hide while Alonso takes fight to Ferraris

2023 Bahrain Grand Prix pre-race analysis

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The revolutionary new era of Formula 1 kicked off 12 months ago with one of the more thrilling hours of qualifying to begin a championship for many years. Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari beating Max Verstappen’s Red Bull announced to the world that the paradigm had shifted and fans were in for a thrilling new season.

But as the season unfolded, Red Bull and Verstappen shattered dreams and records alike with a brutally dominant run, making Sundays a question not of if they would win, but how.

With the first Saturday of the season now confined to history, it’s easy to look at Red Bull’s advantage and assume that 2023 will simply be the sequel to 2022. An exhibition of excellence by the world champions. However, with the stage set for the opening race of the championship, this could be a whole different show to last time out in Abu Dhabi.

Narratively, the central plot remains the same: Red Bull are comfortable favourites to reach the chequered flag first. Despite agonising over their balance over Friday night, Red Bull, as they always do, found a solution when they needed to most. Their reward was Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez starting 2023 as they finished 2022 – locking out the front row on a Saturday.

How pole was won – and lost

(L to R): Sergio Perez, Max Verstappen, Red Bull, Bahrain International Circuit, 2023
Perez wasn’t far off Verstappen’s pace
Perez was naturally disappointed to begin a new season being beaten by his team mate, but must take heart from how closely he pushed the world champion. Perez was as much as a tenth up on Verstappen in the middle sector on their final run, until the pair climbed the uphill left-hander of turn 11 and Verstappen edged ahead through turn 13.

Red Bull were the only cars to breach the 90-second barrier. Leclerc qualified third with a 1’30.000, a metaphor for the separation between the champions and their rivals. But it could easily have been closer – Leclerc lost two-tenths of the 0.29his -second gap to Verstappen through the first corner, keeping largely in pace with the Red Bulls over the remainder of the lap. He may have improved with a second attempt, but Ferrari approached Q3 with Sunday’s race firmly at the forefront of their minds.

But the most intriguing element of qualifying was the litmus test for Aston Martin and Fernando Alonso, who had threatened to produced a remarkable upset all weekend until qualifying fifth – still a remarkable result for the team which could not escape Q1 here last year. Alonso attacked his sole Q3 lap hard and was even quicker than Leclerc over the first half of the lap. However, Alonso lost the bulk of his time on the exit of corners – particularly turns one, ten and 11 – suggesting the AMR23 lacks the traction that the RB19 enjoys at this rear-limited circuit.

Alonso was, of course, delighted to secure a top-five start ahead of the two Mercedes, which find themselves now staring at the prospect of having to compete for the honour of third-fastest team on the grid. While George Russell largely shadowed Alonso around the lap, holding a tenth of a second over Lewis Hamilton as he did. At the tricky turn 13 Russell gave away around three-tenths to Verstappen, falling behind Hamilton and Alonso before making up time on the pair of them through the final corner He ended up just 0.004s behind Alonso and less than five-hundredths ahead of his team mate.

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Race pace comparison

Charles Leclerc, Ferrari, Bahrain International Circuit, 2023
Ferrari are wary of the threat from Aston Martin
Although today gave us the first true indication of how the ten teams compare for performance, it only accounts for ultimate single lap pace. The fog of war hasn’t fully dissipated when it comes to how each of the teams at the front of the field will fare over 57 laps.

But while most in the field expected Red Bull to be fastest on Saturday, they may be concerned by how confident both drivers were that they would be even better in race trim. “We made some compromises in qualifying for tomorrow’s race and hopefully that will pay off so we can have a very strong race car,” Perez said, echoing Verstappen’s own assessment after qualifying.

At Ferrari, Red Bull’s closest rivals, Carlos Sainz Jnr could only concur with Perez’s view that the champions could be even more formidable over a race distance.

“I think Red Bull is going to be very, very strong tomorrow,” Sainz admitted. “If in qualy there are one step [ahead], on race pace it looks like they are one-and-a-half steps in front.”

Data from Friday’s second practice – the only true representative session for longer runs being held in the same cool, floodlit conditions as the race itself – showed that Sainz was probably correct in this view. While Verstappen averaged a 1’37.220 on soft tyres during Friday’s high fuel runs, Sainz could only manage a 1’38.5 on his first run and a 1’38.1 on his second, while his team mate Leclerc’s best seven lap stint averaged out at a 1’37.748.

Crucially, that meant the Ferrari was not the closest competitor to Verstappen on the long runs, with that honour instead going to Alonso’s Aston Martin. Sainz is convinced that Alonso will pose a genuine challenge to them over the course of the race.

Fernando Alonso, Aston Martin, Bahrain International Circuit, 2023
Alonso is determined to seize podium chance
“It is true that we beat them in qualy, but in the race we expect them to be a level par or lower degradation than us,” Sainz explained. “So it’s going to be a tough, tough Sunday. But I always go into races thinking we can win them.”

Alonso is also brimming with confidence over the potential his new team has to fight for its first ever podium in British Racing Green as well as only his second podium appearance since coming out of retirement.

“The strength of this car has been the long runs,” Alonso said. “Very low degradation on the car, taking care of the tyres very good. We start top five, so if there is an opportunity, we are very close to the podium, we will for sure not lose it.”

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Strategy

Beyond having the best possible starting positions for both their drivers, Red Bull have the luxury of the most comprehensive data on all three tyre compounds of any of the ten teams. They were the only team to fit the hard compound in final practice, making them the only top team to have sampled all three compounds across the weekend.

Alex Albon, Williams, Bahrain International Circuit, 2023
The hard tyres haven’t been seen much so far
Unlike in 2022, Pirelli predict that the best strategy for this year’s race will be a two stopper, starting on the softs and switching to the hard tyres before returning to softs for the final stint. The medium is unlikely to be used throughout the field, offering neither the durability of the new hard or the grip of the softs. Pirelli also believe the hard tyre will be the “key to the race” tomorrow, making it especially helpful for Red Bull that they’ve gathered at least some data from Saturday afternoon.

The importance of the soft tyre led Ferrari to sacrifice a second Q3 run for Leclerc in order to save a crucial new set of softs for the race, likely to be used for the start. The first notable strategic choice by the team made under new chief strategist Ravin Jain, who is carrying a significant weight of expectation after Ferrari’s error-strewn 2022 campaign.

“Starting from the second row is actually a positive result considering that we will have the only driver with an extra set of new soft tyres,” said new team principal Frederic Vasseur. “For tomorrow, we need to put everything together and manage degradation.”

Despite not following the approach taken with his team mate, Sainz believes having the advantage of unspoilt tyres will be worth as much as “three to five seconds” of race time – perhaps not enough to overcome the Red Bulls, but maybe a useful buffer to defend from the likes of Alonso behind.

But while this first race of the season appears to be a relatively straightforward affair strategy-wise, last year’s race was also a stark reminder of how nothing is certain in the first race of a season – especially after only three days of testing. Red Bull may appear to have the pace this weekend, but not even the world champions will be counting the 25 points before either one of the RB19s takes the chequered flag first.

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Qualifying times in full

PositionNumberDriverTeamQ1 timeQ2 time (vs Q1)Q3 time (vs Q2)
11Max VerstappenRed Bull1’31.2951’30.503 (-0.792s)1’29.708 (-0.795s)
211Sergio PerezRed Bull1’31.4791’30.746 (-0.733s)1’29.846 (-0.900s)
316Charles LeclercFerrari1’31.0941’30.282 (-0.812s)1’30.000 (-0.282s)
455Carlos Sainz JnrFerrari1’30.9931’30.515 (-0.478s)1’30.154 (-0.361s)
514Fernando AlonsoAston Martin-Mercedes1’31.1581’30.645 (-0.513s)1’30.336 (-0.309s)
663George RussellMercedes1’31.0571’30.507 (-0.550s)1’30.340 (-0.167s)
744Lewis HamiltonMercedes1’31.5431’30.513 (-1.030s)1’30.384 (-0.129s)
818Lance StrollAston Martin-Mercedes1’31.1841’31.127 (-0.057s)1’30.836 (-0.291s)
931Esteban OconAlpine-Renault1’31.5081’30.914 (-0.594s)1’30.984 (+0.070s)
1027Nico HulkenbergHaas-Ferrari1’31.2041’30.809 (-0.395s)
114Lando NorrisMcLaren-Mercedes1’31.6521’31.381 (-0.271s)Missed by 0.254s
1277Valtteri BottasAlfa Romeo-Ferrari1’31.5041’31.443 (-0.061s)Missed by 0.316s
1324Zhou GuanyuAlfa Romeo-Ferrari1’31.6151’31.473 (-0.142s)Missed by 0.346s
1422Yuki TsunodaAlphaTauri-Red Bull1’31.4001’32.510 (+1.110s)Missed by 1.383s
1523Alexander AlbonWilliams-Mercedes1’31.461
162Logan SargeantWilliams-Mercedes1’31.652Missed by 0.000s
1720Kevin MagnussenHaas-Ferrari1’31.892Missed by 0.240s
1881Oscar PiastriMcLaren-Mercedes1’32.101Missed by 0.449s
1921Nyck de VriesAlphaTauri-Red Bull1’32.121Missed by 0.469s
2010Pierre GaslyAlpine-Renault1’32.181Missed by 0.529s

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Sector times

PositionNumberDriverSector oneSector twoSector threeUltimate lapDeficit to ultimate lap
11Max Verstappen28.722 (1)38.514 (1)22.458 (1)1’29.6940.014
211Sergio Perez28.723 (2)38.537 (2)22.538 (2)1’29.7980.048
316Charles Leclerc28.825 (4)38.614 (3)22.561 (4)1’30.000
455Carlos Sainz Jnr28.735 (3)38.7 (4)22.661 (7)1’30.0960.058
514Fernando Alonso28.852 (7)38.774 (5)22.646 (6)1’30.2720.064
663George Russell28.845 (6)38.87 (7)22.559 (3)1’30.2740.066
744Lewis Hamilton28.844 (5)38.829 (6)22.616 (5)1’30.2890.095
818Lance Stroll28.966 (8)39.07 (9)22.733 (9)1’30.7690.067
927Nico Hulkenberg29.042 (11)38.957 (8)22.81 (10)1’30.809
1031Esteban Ocon29.026 (9)39.104 (10)22.696 (8)1’30.8260.088
114Lando Norris29.235 (13)39.21 (11)22.936 (13)1’31.381
1224Zhou Guanyu29.041 (10)39.338 (15)23.005 (16)1’31.3840.089
1377Valtteri Bottas29.198 (12)39.32 (14)22.881 (11)1’31.3990.044
1422Yuki Tsunoda29.242 (14)39.229 (13)22.929 (12)1’31.400
1523Alexander Albon29.25 (16)39.224 (12)22.987 (15)1’31.461
162Logan Sargeant29.352 (17)39.343 (16)22.957 (14)1’31.652
1710Pierre Gasly29.247 (15)39.412 (18)23.087 (19)1’31.7460.435
1820Kevin Magnussen29.414 (19)39.369 (17)23.095 (20)1’31.8780.014
1921Nyck de Vries29.382 (18)39.634 (20)23.066 (17)1’32.0820.039
2081Oscar Piastri29.561 (20)39.454 (19)23.086 (18)1’32.101

Speed trap

PositionNumberDriverCarEngineModelMax kph (mph)
155Carlos Sainz JnrFerrariFerrariSF-23326.6 (202.9)
211Sergio PerezRed BullRed BullRB19325.7 (202.4)
316Charles LeclercFerrariFerrariSF-23325.2 (202.1)
444Lewis HamiltonMercedesMercedesW14324.4 (201.6)
510Pierre GaslyAlpineRenaultA523324.2 (201.4)
61Max VerstappenRed BullRed BullRB19323.2 (200.8)
723Alexander AlbonWilliamsMercedesFW45323.1 (200.8)
82Logan SargeantWilliamsMercedesFW45322.8 (200.6)
931Esteban OconAlpineRenaultA523321.6 (199.8)
1014Fernando AlonsoAston MartinMercedesAMR23320.8 (199.3)
1118Lance StrollAston MartinMercedesAMR23320.8 (199.3)
1222Yuki TsunodaAlphaTauriRed BullAT04320.3 (199.0)
1363George RussellMercedesMercedesW14320.3 (199.0)
144Lando NorrisMcLarenMercedesMCL60320.2 (199.0)
1527Nico HulkenbergHaasFerrariVF-23318.6 (198.0)
1624Zhou GuanyuAlfa RomeoFerrariC43318.3 (197.8)
1777Valtteri BottasAlfa RomeoFerrariC43318.3 (197.8)
1820Kevin MagnussenHaasFerrariVF-23317 (197.0)
1981Oscar PiastriMcLarenMercedesMCL60316.8 (196.9)
2021Nyck de VriesAlphaTauriRed BullAT04316.6 (196.7)

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Lap times – third practice

This chart shows all the drivers’ lap times (in seconds). Very slow laps omitted. Scroll to zoom, drag to pan, right-click to reset:

Over to you

Is anything going to stop Red Bull? And what will Alonso achieve with his rapid Aston Martin?

Share your views on the Bahrain Grand Prix in the comments.

2023 Bahrain Grand Prix

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Author information

Will Wood
Will has been a RaceFans contributor since 2012 during which time he has covered F1 test sessions, launch events and interviewed drivers. He mainly...

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5 comments on “Red Bull tipped to run and hide while Alonso takes fight to Ferraris”

  1. The importance of the soft tyre led Ferrari to sacrifice a second Q3 run for Leclerc in order to save a crucial new set of softs for the race, likely to be used for the start.

    But didn’t Red Bull do this exact thing, but in the better Q2 session rather than sacrificing the more crucial second Q3 run?

    1. @sjaakfoo I think, yes, but they used all soft sets, with one having only an out-lap done.

  2. Is anything going to stop Red Bull? – No except for unreliability.
    And what will Alonso achieve with his rapid Aston Martin? – P3

  3. Aston Martin might be like Lotus in 2012 – they are not the fastest car but they handle their tyres very well. Which means Alonso has a genuine chance to fight for podiums in many races and even an occasional win.

    Kimi finished 2012 in third, after Alonso (back then, a Ferrari driver) and Vettel (a Red Bull driver). If Alonso finishes third this and next seasons – after Leclerc and Verstappen – this would be a great way to end his career. Not in a team that sometimes gets into Q3, but in a team that can fight and progress.

  4. BLS (@brightlampshade)
    5th March 2023, 11:34

    This feels like the start of a very depressing season. The equivalent of 2014 if Rosberg was swapped for Hulkenberg.

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