If any early conclusions can be taken from the Formula One season opening Bahrain Grand Prix on Sunday, the main one is that Red Bull seems to be on a league of their own right from the start.
World champion Max Verstappen started on pole and needed only a few metres to open a one-second advantage over the rest of the grid.
The Dutchman finished the race 11.987 second ahead of team-mate Sergio Perez and 38.637 second ahead the second fastest team – the Aston Martin of Fernando Alonso.
“I think for me, the first stint was the most important, where I could pull a gap. Once we had the gap it was just about making sure we could do our stint plan. And that worked out well,” Verstappen said.
He stressed, however, that even though “it looked a bit lonely out there,” there were “a lot of things to look at, or fine-tune.”
At last year’s season-opening in Bahrain, Red Bull were forced to retire both cars due to reliability issues and saw Ferrari claim a one-two finish. But the Italian team didn’t show the same dominance Red Bull did this year.
“Red Bull have got this championship sewn up. I don’t think anyone will be fighting with them this year,” George Russell of Mercedes conceded.
Red Bull team principal Christian Horner downplayed Russell’s remarks, adding he expects “our rivals to come back hard in the future races.”
Alonso, meanwhile, couldn’t convert the hype around Aston Martin’s performance in practice sessions in a pole position, but benefited from the retirement of Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari to walk away from Bahrain with a podium and “a perfect start.”
“We didn’t expect to be that competitive. I think the aim in 2023 was to get in the mix with the midfield, maybe leading that midfield and get close to the top three teams eventually,” the Spanish driver said after his race debut for the British team.
Aston Martin, who returned to the grid in 2021 after rebranding former F1 team Racing Point, have finished seventh in both seasons they participated so far.
But Alonso is hopeful they can aim for higher goals this season.
“If we are strong in the next two races, I think we will have a very good 2023.” (dpa)
