Max Verstappen fastest in both practice sessions

Sakhir, 26 March 2021: Red Bull Racing’s Max Verstappen continued to set the pace at the Bahrain International Circuit as he set the quickest lap of the second practice session for the Bahrain Grand Prix ahead of McLaren’s Lando Norris and Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton. The F1 World Championship begins on Sunday with the first race at BIC. 

The opening part of the 60-minute session saw much of the running conducted on medium compound tyres with Verstappen leading the way early thanks to a lap of 1:31.842 after an early P1 time from Hamilton was deleted for exceeding track limits. 

The champion was soon back on top, however. Mercedes team-mate Valtteri 

Bottas briefly held sway but a second run on mediums that yielded a lap of 1:31.261 took Hamilton back to the top of the order. 

It was during this phase of the session that the season’s first brush with barriers occurred. Kimi Räikkönen lost control on the exit of Turn 2 and the Alfa Romeo driver slid off into the barriers damaging both ends of his car. The Finn was able to keep his car going, however, and he was able to limp back to the pits for repairs. 

When the field made the switch to soft tyres for performance runs soon after the incident, Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz was the first to make a step up, topping the timesheet with a lap of 1:31.127. Hamilton then found five hundredths of a second to take P1 again before Norris usurped him with a lap of 1:30.942.

Verstappen, though, had just emerged on track and at the end of his soft-tyre run the Dutch driver had edged ahead of the McLaren man by 0.095s to set the fastest lap of the session. Verstappen also posted the best times in the final two sectors. 

With the performance runs completed the field then switched the traditional FP2 long-run data gathering. 

Behind Hamilton Carlos Sainz was fourth for Ferrari with a lap of 1:31.127. That was good enough to put him almost a tenth ahead of Bottas, with the Finnish Mercedes shading the second McLaren of Daniel Ricciardo by just over a hundredth of a second. 

Yuki Tsunoda continued to impress for AlphaTauri with the Japanese rookie setting the seventh fastest time. His lap of 1:31.294 saw him finish a tenth ahead of Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll and two tenths ahead of more experienced AlphaTauri team-mate Pierre Gasly. 

The final top 10 position was taken by Sergio Perez in the second Red Bull. The Mexican ended the session with a best time of 1:31.503 to sit 0.656s behind Verstappen.

2021 FIA Formula 1 Bahrain Grand Prix – Free Practice 2
1 Max Verstappen Red Bull 23 1:30.847  
2 Lando Norris McLaren 25 1:30.942 0.095
3 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 24 1:31.082 0.235
4 Carlos Sainz  Ferrari  26 1:31.127 0.280
5 Valtteri Bottas Mercedes 23 1:31.218 0.371
6 Daniel Ricciardo McLaren 22 1:31.230 0.383
7 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri 23 1:31.294 0.447
8 Lance Stroll Aston Martin 24 1:31.393 0.546
9 Pierre Gasly AlphaTauri 27 1:31.483 0.636
10 Sergio Perez Red Bull 23 1:31.503 0.656
11 Esteban Ocon Alpine 24 1:31.601 0.754
12 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 26 1:31.612 0.765
13 Antonio Giovinazzi Alfa Romeo 27 1:31.740 0.893
14 Sebastian Vettel Aston Martin 26 1:31.769 0.922
15 Fernando Alonso Alpine 24 1:31.770 0.923
16 Kimi Raikkonen Alfa Romeo 15 1:31.862 1.015
17 George Russell Williams 28 1:32.331 1.484
18 Mick Schumacher Haas 24 1:33.297 2.450
19 Nicholas Latifi Williams 28 1:33.400 2.553
20 Nikita Mazepin Haas 19 1:33.449 2.602

Free Practice 1

Earlier, the Dutch driver used soft compound Pirelli tyre to claim top spot in the session, just under three tenths of a second ahead of Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas, with McLaren’s Lando Norris third. Defending World Champion Lewis Hamilton finished fourth. 

With Friday’s practice session cut to an hour each this season the session was a busy one with returning two-time champion Fernando Alonso leading the field out of the pit lane in his Alpine when the lights went green to signal the start of the first grand prix track session of the new season. 

It was Red Bull who quickly forced their way to the top of the timesheet, however, with new recruit Sergio Pérez claiming top spot as he bolted on a set of soft tyres inside the first quarter of an hour. 

Mercedes pursued a similar strategy and Hamilton then went quickest on soft tyres with a time of 1:32.884. Bottas then moved ahead but Verstappen eclipsed everyone with his first flying lap of 1:32.214.

With early soft tyre runs complete teams switched focus to longer running before once again looking at performance in the closing stages. 

Norris was the first to move up the timesheet, with the McLaren driver posting a lap of 1:31.897 on soft tyres. With improvements occurring across the order the Red Bull and Mercedes drivers eventually emerged with a little more Hamilton went fastest of anyone in the first sector with just over 10 minutes remaining. 

The defending champion seemed to be enjoying a more stable Mercedes than seen in pre-season testing but after setting the fastest first sector the improvement ebbed and he finished the session with a best time of 1:31.921, a tenth behind Norris. 

Bottas, though, was able to extract more from the new Mercedes W12 and he posted a time of 1:31.692 to claim P1. Verstappen was still circling, however, and with purple times in the first two sectors he claimed top spot with 0.298 in hand. 

Charles Leclerc was fifth for Ferrari, six tenths off Verstappen but less than a tenth behind Hamilton, while Pérez was sixth with a lap of 1:32.071, 0.677 behind his new team-mate, though the Mexican did claim the quickest third sector. 

AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly finished seventh in front of Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz, while Daniel Ricciardo was ninth in the second McLaren ahead of Sauber’s Antonio Giovinazzi. 

2021 FIA Formula 1 Bahrain Grand Prix – Free Practice 1 
1 Max Verstappen Red Bull 12 1:31.394  
2 Valtteri Bottas Mercedes 17 1:31.692 0.298
3 Lando Norris McLaren 20 1:31.897 0.503
4 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 15 1:31.921 0.527
5 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 14 1:31.993 0.599
6 Sergio Perez Red Bull 15 1:32.071 0.677
7 Pierre Gasly AlphaTauri 23 1:32.195 0.801
8 Carlos Sainz Ferrari 15 1:32.366 0.972
9 Daniel Ricciardo McLaren 20 1:32.434 1.040
10 Antonio Giovinazzi Alfa Romeo 16 1:32.786 1.392
11 Kimi Raikkonen Alfa Romeo 18 1:33.134 1.740
12 Sebastian Vettel Aston Martin 21 1:33.157 1.763
13 Lance Stroll Aston Martin 20 1:33.233 1.839
14 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri 21 1:33.329 1.935
15 Esteban Ocon Alpine 20 1:33.528 2.134
16 Fernando Alonso Alpine 18 1:33.872 2.478
17 George Russell Williams 22 1:34.127 2.733
18 Nicholas Latifi Williams 22 1:34.340 2.946
19 Mick Schumacher Haas 16 1:34.501 3.107
20 Nikita Mazepin Haas 16 1:34.975 3.581