Sebastian Vettel held off the Mercedes of Valtteri Bottas in a tense and exciting final 10 laps of the Bahrain Grand Prix on Sunday.
Forced onto a one-stop strategy following a terrible incident in the pit-lane which saw a Ferrari mechanic suffer a double leg break after being run over by Kimi Raikkonen, the German had to nurse his tyres to the end, allowing the Finn to close.
A decision by the Italian team to pit both cars first had enabled Mercedes to commit to a one-stop with Bottas, switching him to the Medium tyre rather than the Soft being used by Vettel, but despite gaining by over a second per lap in the closing stages, he couldn’t quite use DRS to draw alongside and attempt a pass.
Lewis Hamilton was involved in a controversial incident with Max Verstappen at the start of Lap 2, as the Dutchman passed him at the first corner only for light contact to be enough to cause a puncture and other damage to his Red Bull, forcing him to retire.
Moments later, the other Red Bull of Daniel Ricciardo ground to a halt on the exit of Turn 8 after his engine shut down while running fourth in a disastrous day for the Milton Keynes outfit.
A Virtual Safety Car was required to clear away the Australian’s car and at the restart, Hamilton used DRS and a double slipstream to pass three cars on the pit straight, jumping up from his starting position of ninth to sixth.
Soon, the world champion was upto fourth and would benefit from the unfortunate incident in the pit-lane involving Raikkonen to take the final spot on the podium.
The undoubted star of the race was Pierre Gasly in fourth for Toro Rosso as the Frenchman eased clear of the midfield to score not only his first points in Formula 1 but also Honda’s best result since returning as an engine supplier.
The Red Bull junior ended the race 13 seconds clear of Kevin Magnussen in fifth, with the Dane narrowly averting disaster with teammate Romain Grosjean after his second pit-stop.
But it was a good result for the Haas team and a good boost in confidence after losing out on the double points finish in Australia, even if Grosjean’s race was ruined by his bargeboard disintegrating with pieces falling off.
Nico Hulkenberg led the two McLaren’s in sixth, seventh and eighth, Fernando Alonso leading teammate Stoffel Vandoorne as they made up for a difficult qualifying.
Marcus Ericsson was another standout performer in ninth for Sauber, using a one-stop strategy to score his first top 10 finish in 50 races and another indication of how close the midfield battle is in 2018.
Esteban Ocon also managed Force India’s first point of the season in 10th.
