2021 Bahrain Grand Prix - Sakhir, March 26 - 28

[dans79]

Congrats to Max, although the big news for me is Ferrari's pace. Charles only a tenth behind Bottas and 3 tenths behind Lewis. This is some major comeback from the horrific pace of last year. Lets hope it continues, although i dont see them challenging Merc and Redbull. They will fight it out with McLaren for the odd podium here and there.

Ferrari/Charles set up the car more towards qualy and Merc more towards race, don`t you think?

I'd concur with that!

[Partymood]

Congrats to Max, although the big news for me is Ferrari's pace. Charles only a tenth behind Bottas and 3 tenths behind Lewis. This is some major comeback from the horrific pace of last year. Lets hope it continues, although i dont see them challenging Merc and Redbull. They will fight it out with McLaren for the odd podium here and there.

Ferrari/Charles set up the car more towards qualy and Merc more towards race, don`t you think?

Did you speak with them?

[Partymood]

Four tenths. Purple in all sectors. High top speed. Balanced poise through the corners.

I smell dominance.

Well, a few days back you were smelling a rocket ship from Mercedes. So let's see how all that will pan out.

I can smell dominance by RBR as well and had that feeling in testing already. The atmosphere is simply a different one this time and has been since testing. They seem to be seriously sure about their package and you can sense that.

I was careful to say they are will be rocket ship after fiveraces. I knew RedBull will run things early out..

The base mercedes is still quick if they can get to handle properly. Telemetry shows Mercedes losing on the corner entry and have to comoromixe the exit a bit. But the base car, when the token parts come into play... Should be quick i have now doubt.

RedBull is dominant now and its just to limit the damage untill our upgrades come into play.

I havent put this "Octo-God" signature here without good insight.

What token part? Isn't it supposed to be on the car already?

[Zynerji]

I feel the only person that can match Verstappen in the Bull is Russell.

I think they should have gone for Stroll instead...

[zibby43]

Observations:

1) Merc did not struggle to make Q3

2) McLaren didn’t come close to out-qualifying Merc

3) The RB in Verstappen’s hands looked excellent today

4) Merc have had similar deficits to Ferrari in Bahrain in 2018 and 2019 in qualifying. It’s one of their weakest circuits in the hybrid era

5) The season is going to be close

[atanatizante]

You’ve got to think the Mercedes/RB strategists (especially Mercedes) are probably a bit annoyed that Leclerc is just behind on softs.

I’m sure the Ferrari is a fundamentally slower car than the one tenth to Bottas in quali would make it seem, so if Charles jumps one or both Mercs off the line he could disrupts a bit.

Actually maybe RB will be happy!

Red/soft tyre has the lowest operation window and tends to overheat more with a stiffer rear setup that Merc has here, thus the slow S3 times they have had ...

On another note, maybe Merc was setting more towards the race and particularly to the medium tyre, which we could have a short glips of that in Q2 ...

It would be nice to see some top speeds after the qualy, Bottas posting a 311km/h on the speed trap, something similar to Max speed after FP3, presumably setting the car for more downforce in order to preserve the rears? my two cents ...

[Manfer]

Congrats to Max, although the big news for me is Ferrari's pace. Charles only a tenth behind Bottas and 3 tenths behind Lewis. This is some major comeback from the horrific pace of last year. Lets hope it continues, although i dont see them challenging Merc and Redbull. They will fight it out with McLaren for the odd podium here and there.

Ferrari/Charles set up the car more towards qualy and Merc more towards race, don`t you think?

Did you speak with them?

Must have.

[Oleo]

Does anybody have a list of the starting tyres for the top 10

Q2 results:


Ham, Bot, Ver, Gas Mediums

[godlameroso]

Max's pole lap onboard looked just like a Mercedes onboard from last year. Red Bull have got a cracking car there.

lol, 1:27.2s v 1:28.9s

It's how it was handling, not the lap time.

All of the cars are slower because of the floor changes - that's why the floor changes were introduced.

The tires alone are a second per lap slower than last year, the other second comes from the aero changes. So the cars have roughly lost about 1 second of performance from the aero changes, .7 of which is nullified by the engine and chassis developments over the winter, which leaves us about 1.3 seconds off the pace.

[pantherxxx]

Observations:

1) Merc did not struggle to make Q3

2) McLaren didn’t come close to out-qualifying Merc

3) The RB in Verstappen’s hands looked excellent today

4) Merc have had similar deficits to Ferrari in Bahrain in 2018 and 2019 in qualifying. It’s one of their weakest circuits in the hybrid era

5) The season is going to be close

That's one thing that Mercedes had deficit to Ferrari in those years, but they still comfortably beat Red Bull. This circuit didn't use to be a strong track for Red Bull either.

[PlatinumZealot]

Well, a few days back you were smelling a rocket ship from Mercedes. So let's see how all that will pan out.

I can smell dominance by RBR as well and had that feeling in testing already. The atmosphere is simply a different one this time and has been since testing. They seem to be seriously sure about their package and you can sense that.

I was careful to say they are will be rocket ship after fiveraces. I knew RedBull will run things early out..

The base mercedes is still quick if they can get to handle properly. Telemetry shows Mercedes losing on the corner entry and have to comoromixe the exit a bit. But the base car, when the token parts come into play... Should be quick i have now doubt.

RedBull is dominant now and its just to limit the damage untill our upgrades come into play.

I havent put this "Octo-God" signature here without good insight.

What token part? Isn't it supposed to be on the car already?

Not that anyone can visibly tell so far. Chassis, Nose, gearbox, seem to be identical to last year's. So something is coming.

[JordanMugen]

Of course not. Don’t be foolish. More that it’s tailored very much to the needs and style of the lead driver.

It's up to the "second" driver to copy the lead driver's data traces. That's how motor racing works after all.

Alonso has no issue the hustle the tricky Alpine for example. Perhaps Red Bull have erred by selecting Perez over the seemingly more adaptable Alonso, but then a clear run for Verstappen without competition is probably better for collecting points (albeit a little dull... really you should and must select the best two drivers you can possibly find! Verstappen + Alonso, Hamilton + Russell).

Seeing how well reversing the top 10 grid does for F2, why not reverse the top qualifying places for the F1 Sprint Race? [Qualifying would, still, however set the grid proper for the Grand Prix, as it does for the F2 feature race.]

[214270]

Anyone know if OCO was affected by SAIs yellow flag in Q2? I gather he was passed the MAZ incident so was unaffected by that spin.

[MKlaus]

not an eye catching piece, but mick has started off well. his long run pace looked much better than mazepin yesterday and today, he handled all his runs well whereas mazepin made overdriving errors.
once again, russel continues to slaughter latifi in qualifying.

without grosjean, magnussen and kvyat, can we still expect some carnage at the start or would it be a dull start? the last hope is perez.

[LM10]

Congrats to Max, although the big news for me is Ferrari's pace. Charles only a tenth behind Bottas and 3 tenths behind Lewis. This is some major comeback from the horrific pace of last year. Lets hope it continues, although i dont see them challenging Merc and Redbull. They will fight it out with McLaren for the odd podium here and there.

Ferrari/Charles set up the car more towards qualy and Merc more towards race, don`t you think?

It’s funny because I can remember you telling this qualy/race set up thing several times in the past well.

Why on earth should Ferrari purely set up for qualifying, if that’s what you mean? All teams know that the race is where it counts. I don’t think Mercedes are the only clever ones.

You also shouldn’t expect RedBull having a (significantly) higher tyre deg than Mercedes, if any.