Bahrain Race Report - Massa Shows Stomach for the Fight

Under-pressure Ferrari driver Felipe Massa answered his critics in the best possible way with a faultless victory for the second year running in Bahrain. It was an imperious performance from the Ferrari team all round as Kimi Raikkonen took the lead in the World Championship race after finishing second. Interestingly the cars that were closest to challenging the Ferraris were not McLaren-Mercedes, they were the BMW F1.08s as Kubica showed that his pole-setting pace was no fluke. BMW are the real deal, no doubt about it. And what of the McLarens? Well Hamilton had a poor start and a crash and ended up a lowly thirteenth, while Kovalainen showed that the McLarens probably didn't have the pace in the car to challenge the Ferraris anyway.

The race had drama from the very first seconds of the race as Lewis Hamilton didn't get the car away from the line at all well. Whether that was a problem on the car or driver error remains to be seen, but either way he found himself plummeting down the field, eventually emerging from the first couple of corners down in tenth place. To make matters worse for McLaren Felipe Massa had managed to get ahead of Kubica into turn one and had clean air to drive away from the pack at the front. Elsewhere on the first lap Jenson Button managed to pick up a rear puncture. The unscheduled stop ruined all his brilliant work from yesterday's qualifying. Also shortly after the start Sebastien Vettel's engine lunched itself, another curious Ferrari engine failure.

The biggest talking point of the race was to come on lap 2. On the run up the hill towards Turn 4 Lewis Hamilton was chasing his old adversary Fernando Alonso when Hamilton crashed into the back of the Renault's right rear tyre. Hamilton's car was launched up in the air briefly and his front wing was torn off, effectively ending all hopes he had of getting any decent points. It was certainly a highly unusual accident. Seeing cars collide like that under braking is not that unusual, as a fraction of a second earlier/later onto the brakes can create a huge speed differential in an F1 car. To see it happen under acceleration is just bizarre. I can't remember ever seeing an incident quite like it. One wonders whether McLaren will ask the race stewards to investigate the matter further to look into just why Fernando Alonso seemed suddenly so slow.

The news of Hamilton's demise would have been music to the ears of the Ferrari drivers, and things were about to get better for the Scuderia as on lap 3 Raikkonen was able to dive past Kubica for second place. It was becoming clear that this was to be a straight battle between the Ferrari drivers for the race win; nobody else had a hope. Elsewhere Nico Rosberg put an excellent move on Jarno Trulli to get up to sixth briefly. However, it transpired that the Williams didn't really have the pace to live with the Toyotas and Trulli was able to retake the position shortly after. McLaren's hopes rested on the shoulders of Heikki Kovalainen but instead of taking the fight to the Ferraris and Kubica he was slipping back into the clutches of Nick Heidfeld. The MP4-28 seemed to be struggling with traction out the slow corners, whereas the BMWs were superb in those areas. It didn't take long for the opportunity to present itself to Heidfeld and sure enough he was able to put a good passing move on the Finn. It was all going wrong for McLaren.

At this early stage of the race all four British drivers were bunched together at the very back of the field. Hamilton eventually started to make progress through the field, but it was clear from the onboard TV shots that his car had suffered some damage aside from the front wing and wasn't handling at all well. Things were about to get worse for two of the other Brits in the race. Button was on a charge in the Honda and was rapidly catching Coulthard's Red Bull. DC seemed to make a sight error in turn 6 as Jenson got an excellent run on him coming through 7. Button took a gamble and went for an ambitious move down the inside into turn 8. DC second guessed the move and closed the door before it had really opened. Button was already committed and had nowhere to go. He took evasive action but it was always going to end in tears. They tangled and both went off the track, and the Honda emerged minus its front wing.

At the first round of pitstops we learned that Kubica was indeed the lightest driver on the grid, perhaps explaining some of his qualifying pace. There was something of a surprise when it turned out that Raikkonen was the first to pit. The fact that he was in the lightest Ferrari and could only manage fourth on the grid shows that it was a rather mediocre qualifying effort form the world champion yesterday. The front runner emerged from the pits without any changes in position.

There was an interesting battle brewing at the back of the field with the two Super Aguris running nose to tail for the entire race. Sato lead through most the race after getting the jump on Davidson from the start. But by the end of the race Davidson emerged victorious, one of the few times that the Brit has managed to get the better of his more experienced teammate on the track.

Throughout the race the Ferraris were in a race of their own. They exchanged fastest laps throughout the race and there was certainly no suggestion of Massa yielding to Raikkonen. They were racing hard, which is refreshing to see from the Ferrari team. Raikkonen's big chance would be to get ahead at the final pit stop. Sadly we were robbed of seeing a really close battle between the two as Kimi ran into very heavy traffic on his out laps, costing him vital seconds. Massa was able to keep the lead with room to spare. And that was how it would finish.

The two BMWs were comfortably in third and fourth behind the Ferraris, with Kovalainen's McLaren a lonely fifth place. Trulli put in another good performance for the Toyota team in sixth, fending off the attentions of Mark Webber. Rosberg picked up the final point on offer with Glock and Alonso rounding out the top ten. The other notable performance of the day was Giancarlo Fisichella taking an impressive 12th place for the fledgling Force India team.

So after three races we can be in no doubt that Ferrari are strong favourites to emerge with the two championships come October. After a sticky start they have bounced back in style, leaving their rivals with a lot of work to do. None more so than McLaren, who now appear to have slipped behind BMW in terms of raw pace. You can be sure there will be plenty of updates coming for all teams for the start of the European season in a couple of weeks, and McLaren will be praying that they help them claw back some of Ferrari's current advantage. Roll on Barcelona...

Provisional Race Result

1. Massa
2. Raikkonen
3. Kubica
4. Heidfeld
5. Kovalainen
6. Trulli
7. Webber
8. Rosberg
9. Glock
10. Alonso
11. Barrichello
12. Fisichella
13. Hamilton
14. Nakajima
15. Bourdais
16. Davidson
17. Sato
18. Coulthard
19. Sutil
ret Piquet
ret Button
ret Vettel Read more!

Bahrain Qualifying Report - Kubica Stars as Massa Falters

Pole on Pole? Pole to Pole? Pole Dancing His Way to Pole? Pole Pollaxes His Way to Pole Position? The tabloid headline writing possibilities are endless! Regardless of your pun of choice, the result is that young Polish driver has taken his first ever pole position by the slimmest of margins, and the first for BMW-F1. Read on to find out more...

Robert Kubica upset the form books with a sensational debut pole position in the Bahrain desert. Everything pointed towards a Ferrari pole position and most likely an all Ferrari front row judging by the pace in yesterday's practice sessions. However, it wasn't to be as the young Polish driver beat Massa into second place, with Lewis Hamilton and Kimi Raikkonen in third and fourth respectively.

The first session included a red flag as Takuma Sato lost the back end of the Super Aguri on the exit to the final corner, spinning out into the wall. His car was too badly damaged to continue, though should make tomorrow's race without any problems. The big loser in Q1 was definitely David Coulthard, who finished the session down in 17th. It has been a rather disappointing performance from the Red Bull team so far this weekend, after showing so much promise in Malaysia. Sebastien Bourdais was probably the star of the session, making it through to the second session for the first time in his debut season.

The big story of Q2 was Jenson Button squeezing through in 10th place by the thinnest of margins, just edging out Mark Webber and his teammate Rubens Barrichello. Button would eventually end up an excellent ninth place for Honda. Aside from that everything went to form in this session.

Going into the final session Felipe Massa was in such confident form that it looked like he would breeze through to secure pole, but it wasn't to be. Lewis Hamilton was the first of the big boys to show his hand, showing that the crash he suffered in practice yersterday hasn't set him back too much. Kubica and Massa both went faster though by the end of the first hot laps. In the final runs it was Hamilton again who was the first across the line, and again he went quickest. However, behind him Kubica was flying and setting fastest sector times and went through two tenths quicker than his good friend Hamilton. Raikkonen was next through but was a slightly disappointing fourth. Massa was the last of the main contenders on a hot lap, but the timing screens showed that he had lost nearly three tenths in the middle sector due to a slight error. He couldn't manage to overhaul Kubica, missing out by a few hundredths of a second.

So a wonderful first pole position for Kubica, and for his young team BMW. Judging by how fast he was in comparison to teammate Heidfeld who finished down in sixth you would have to assume that he's very light on fuel, but a remarkable performance nonetheless. What does this mean for Felipe Massa though? He has had a dreadful start to the season and there have been rumours surrounding his future with the Scuderia. So far this weekend he had silenced the doubters, looking incredibly fast. But when it really mattered, he yet again failed to produce the goods by making a mistake on his final run. Still, he has the race tomorrow to redeem himself, and will still have to be the pre-race favourite to take the win.

Qualifying Results

01 R. Kubica BMW 1:33.096
02 F. Massa Ferrari 1:33.123
03 L. Hamilton McLaren 1:33.292
04 K. Räikkönen Ferrari 1:33.418
05 H. Kovalainen McLaren 1:33.488
06 N. Heidfeld BMW 1:33.737
07 J. Trulli Toyota 1:33.994
08 N. Rosberg Williams 1:34.015
09 J. Button Honda 1:35.057
10 F. Alonso Renault 1:35.115
11 M. Webber Red Bull 1:32.371
12 R. Barrichello Honda 1:32.508
13 T. Glock Toyota 1:32.528
14 N. Piquet jr. Renault 1:32.790
15 S. Bourdais Scuderia Toro Rosso 1:32.915
16 K. Nakajima Williams 1:32.943
17 D. Coulthard Red Bull 1:33.433
18 G. Fisichella Force India F1 1:33.501
19 S. Vettel Scuderia Toro Rosso 1:33.501
20 A. Sutil Force India F1 1:33.845
21 A. Davidson Super Aguri 1:34.140
22 T. Sato Super Aguri 1:35.725

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Bahrain Grand Prix Friday Practice

Under fire Ferrari driver Felipe Massa emerged from Friday's two practice sessions with his head held high after topping the time sheets twice. It was a fairly devastating display of Ferrari dominance all day long, as Kimi Raikkonen finished second in both sessions too. But in the end that wasn't the big story of the day, as McLaren's Lewis Hamilton crashed heavily in the second session causing extensive damage to his MP4-28.

Hamilton ran too high on the kerbs between turns six and seven and the back end stepped out viciously on him, sending him sliding side-on into the barriers at speed. Thankfully he emerged unscathed from his shunt, but there will be sleepless nights in the McLaren pit tonight as the mechanics have a considerable amount of work to do to get the car ready for qualifying tomorrow. McLaren had shown earlier in the day that they have decent pace in their car but they will be somewhat worried that they couldn't really match Ferrari's pace on the day.

Felipe Massa ended the session almost a full second quicker than his teammate Kimi Raikkonen after a late qualifying simulation run in second practice. None of the other teams could even come close to matching that kind of pace. It is clearly advantage Ferrari going into qualifying tomorrow.

Elsewhere Williams impressed, with both Nico Rosberg and Kazuki Nakajima finishing high up on the time sheets in both sessions. They'll be looking to bounce back after a difficult weekend in Malaysia. BMW's Robert Kubica showed that the car has some decent pace, although Nick Heidfeld ended the day strangely off the pace. The star of practice, aside from Massa, was Sebastien Bourdais. He put his Toro Rosso in an impressive ninth place in the second session, and ran consistently well throughout the day.

So far then this weekend the Ferraris appear to be cruising, and their rivals have a huge amount of work to do if they are to stop them running away with this race... Read more!

2008 Bahrain Grand Prix Preview

This weekend sees the Formula One circus move to the Kingdom of Bahrain for the fifth running of the Bahrain Grand Prix. As has all too often been the case over the past season or so, the sport has a cloud of controversy following it wherever it may go. However, I don't think the sport has ever seen one quite like the one that shook the world's motorsport fans last Sunday, the fallout from which looks nowhere near settling. With Max Mosley absent from this Grand Prix for obvious reasons, let's hope that all the talk this weekend is about what goes on on the black stuff rather than one what certain people choose to do (or have done to them!) in seedy London basement apartments. Somehow, I doubt it will be though...

Ferrari go into the race on a high after a very strong showing last time out in Malaysia, spoiled only by Felipe Massa's unforced error and DNF. They should have every right to be confident of a race victory this weekend, especially as they were only one of two teams (Toyota being the other) to have tested at this very circuit over the winter. Both Ferrari and arch-rivals McLaren have tried to play down the significance of this testing session, but the advantage should definitely be there, no matter how small, as Ferrari absolutely obliterated Toyota in that particular winter test.

McLaren will be looking to bounce back after they dropped the ball big time with their needless-penalty hit weekend in Malaysia. That's not a mistake we will ever be seeing again, as the rules for qualification have since been tweaked to avoid that situation, but McLaren will know that their weekend will need to be perfect if they are to keep pace with the Ferraris. One suspects it will also need to be perfect if they are to stay ahead of the BMWs, who have looked extremely strong so far this season.

After the two "fly away" races down under, this will be the first race we will be seeing some of the updated aerodynamic packages for some of the teams. We will see if anyone has made any significant progress back in the windtunnels while the race teams have been jet-setting around the globe. We probably won't be seeing any widespread, major updates until they hit Barcelona next time out, but there will be tweaks aplenty for the more well-heeled teams. It will be interesting to keep an eye on who has made steps forward or not.

The race will be the third hot race in a row for the drivers and teams to contend with, but this time out they will have new foes to contend with in the form of dust and high winds instead of the extreme humidity down under. Due to the very exposed nature of the track wind has often been an issue here, and this weekend the predictions are for it to be especially windy here. This is bad news for the drivers on two fronts: firstly the wind blows dust onto the circuit giving unpredictable traction; secondly it can play havoc with the cars' delicately balanced aerodynamic setups. A strong gust of wind during one of the Sakhir circuit's numerous high-speed, high-downforce corners can easily cause a sudden loss of grip.

The drivers should definitely be earning their wages if the winds are up as high as predicted, and it should keep things exciting to watch...
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