Bahrain: The Race Seen from the Pits

Red Bull

Sebastian Vettel – Winner

Mark Webber – 7th

Christian Horner, Team Principal: An absolutely impeccable drive from Sebastian today. He made two brilliant overtakes, one on Fernando (Alonso) and the other on Nico Rosberg. Then, he dominated the race until the finish and brilliantly preserved his tires. The strategy worked wonderfully with the tires saved during qualifying, which led to a beautiful victory with a three-stop strategy. For Mark, after driving well in the first stint and making progress after the first stops, in the second stint, he attacked hard in the initial laps placing himself in second position. Unfortunately, he couldn’t go as far as expected in this stint, putting him under pressure for the next two. His last stop placed him with those on a two-stop strategy, and then it was mostly about getting to the end. Despite defending tremendously well against Lewis, he ran out of performance with his tires before the end of the race, but still scored good points.

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Lotus

Kimi Räikkönen – 2nd

Romain Grosjean – 3rd

Eric Boullier, Team Director: « We’re here once again, just like in 2012! This time it was a bit more complicated – especially after our performance in qualifying was not as good as hoped – but we showed our pace throughout the weekend and confirmed this speed when it mattered. Victory wasn’t really within our grasp after the start we had, but finishing with a double podium when the top 6 was a more realistic goal before the race is a great performance from everyone. I’m delighted for the whole team here in Bahrain and at Enstone; it’s a well-deserved result. »

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Force India

Paul di Resta – 4th

Adrian Sutil – 13th

Dr Vijay Mallya, Team Principal: « A fantastic job by the team and great driving from Paul has seen us finish a hair’s breadth from the podium today. Even though we missed out on third place, the 12 points earned put us in 5th place in the championship and give us reasons to be optimistic for the upcoming races. Obviously, we could have done so much more if Adrian had not suffered a puncture on the first lap. The contact with Massa clearly cost us dearly because Adrian’s race pace was similar to Paul’s, and we could have had both cars in the points at the finish. We’ll focus on the positives and appreciate this 4th place, which confirmed the car’s pace and showed once again that we can be at the front and compete with some of the best teams. »

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Mercedes

Lewis Hamilton – 5th

Nico Rosberg – 9th

Ross Brawn, Mercedes Team Director: « We struggled in the first part of the race when track temperatures were at their highest. It’s a problem we need to solve, and we will continue to work on solutions to improve our performance in this area. In the second half of the race, when track temperatures cooled a little, our pace wasn’t so bad – particularly with Lewis. We have two cars in the points at home, both drivers enjoyed the race. Lewis and Nico did the best job possible with the car we had this afternoon, but damage limitation was necessary for both of them. However, we must prioritize better coping with high temperatures. The tires are the same for everyone, and our performance is not as good as that of our competitors in these conditions. »

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McLaren

Sergio Pérez – 6th

Jenson Button – 10th

Martin Whitmarsh, Team Principal: The Gulf Air Bahrain Grand Prix was a fantastic race, and I’m sure it was very enjoyable for the tens of millions of viewers who watched it at home and for the lucky ones who were here in Sakhir to see it in person. Checo had his best race for Vodafone McLaren Mercedes so far, overtaking Fernando (Alonso) and Mark (Webber) in the final laps to finish sixth at the end. It was very good, especially considering he was able to maintain a very fast race pace despite having damaged his rear wing and one of the flaps on the front wing. Jenson would have finished in the same spot if he hadn’t had to make an extra pit stop just ten laps from the end. However, he also managed to finish in the points. The two fought hard for much of the afternoon. They were sometimes a bit too close, in fact, but that’s part of racing. Jenson and Checo are both fast, strong, and hungry for success. That’s exactly how it should be. It’s called motor racing, and we at Vodafone McLaren Mercedes have always allowed our drivers to fight. It’s the very essence of this sport. That being said, I think it’s fair to acknowledge that Checo was a bit too aggressive on Jenson this afternoon, and I think he knows it. From here, we’ll head back to Woking where we’ll work hard to bring a package of upgrades for Spain, where we hope to continue our ongoing development process of the MP4-28 in three weeks to make it the competitive machine it needs to be.

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Ferrari

Fernando Alonso – 8th

Felipe Massa – 15th

Stefano Domenicali, Team Principal: « This is really not the result we wanted after showing all weekend that we were capable of fighting at the top of the standings. Today’s results must be quickly forgotten even though we are very disappointed not to have brought back the points we hoped for… Despite his DRS problem, Fernando [Alonso] drove superbly, mastering overtaking and delivering impressive lap times. Felipe [Massa]’s race was also very complicated: initially, he suffered a collision on the first lap that damaged the front wing of his F138, and then, problems with the hard tires further compromised his race. A quick review after the first 4 races of the season shows that we haven’t brought back the points we should have. In three weeks, we will be back in Europe and it will be important to change the trend at that time. Until then, we will continue to develop the car, which still has a lot of potential to offer. »

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Williams

Pastor Maldonado – 11th

Valtteri Bottas – 14th

Mike Coughlan, Technical Director: Given our pace on Friday, we expected to perform better in the race than we were able to achieve in qualifying, and that’s what happened today. We had planned three pit stops for our two cars, and our strategy worked as we thought it would. We almost made it into the points. Even though a few cars ahead had problems, we pushed until the checkered flag. Both cars could have fought together at the end, but Valtteri lost time due to an issue during his pit stops. We now need to continue improving the car’s performance for the upcoming races.

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Sauber

Nico Hülkenberg – 12th

Esteban Gutiérrez – 18th

Tom McCullough, Track Engineering Director: « It was clear that it would be difficult for Esteban starting from the back of the grid. Unfortunately, we had to change his front wing on the first lap. It was impossible for him to make up for the lost ground from there. Nico’s race went as expected but we simply weren’t fast enough to score points. We need to look at the data in detail, regroup, and prepare for Barcelona. »

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Toro Rosso

Daniel Ricciardo – 16th

**Jean-Eric Vergne** – Withdraw

Franz Tost, Team Principal: Our race pace with Daniel is a mystery for the moment, as the car clearly and unexpectedly lacked performance today. Daniel did everything he could, and we also tried to make adjustments during the stops, but it didn’t work. As soon as we can, we will study the car, because we believe there is a significant problem, which would be the obvious cause of our poor performance today. Regarding Jean-Eric, he was unfortunate to be put out by a Caterham and a Williams. When we could see the car could still run during his stop, we sent him back on track. However, after a while, it became clear that the damage to the floor and other components was causing the car to overheat to an unacceptable level. There was no reason to continue, so we decided to call him in and retire the car.

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Caterham

Charles Pic – 17th

Giedo van der Garde – 21st

Caterham did not publish the statements of the team representatives.

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Marussia

Jules Bianchi – 19th

Max Chilton – 20th

John Booth, Team Director: « Unfortunately, it has been a difficult weekend for us. Our performance today was defined by the fact that the track did not play to the strengths of our car and at the same time, the cars around us made their own progress. It was a busy race in the pits due to the increased degradation of our tires. Ultimately, I think we extracted the maximum from our car but we clearly need to make a big step forward for Barcelona to maintain our goal of improving the car throughout the year. We are now returning to the factory for busy weeks ahead to prepare our upgrades for the start of the European season while analyzing what we’ve learned over the last two races. I am certain that the result of this work will be a much-improved car for the next race so that we can fight where we want to. »

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