Lewis Hamilton won in Bahrain Sunday as Charles Leclerc picked up his first Formula 1 podium and Valtteri Bottas retained the championship lead.
It was a race of three parts: early chaos, a calm midsection and late drama. Ferrari should have run away with things and it looked as though they would until a Sebastian Vettel spin under pressure from Hamilton and a power unit problem for Leclerc gifted Mercedes a second 1-2 finish in the first two races in 2019.
“Today it was a really hard job,” said Hamilton. “This weekend the Ferraris have been incredible and I just had to see Charles (in parc fermé) because he did such a great job and I’m sure it’s a devastating result for him because he had done the job to win the race. We were definitely lucky today but you have to take it as it comes.
“I still pushed and gave it everything I could in the race and the fight that I had with Vettel was great fun for me. If you look at the flag at the top of the tower, there was a massive headwind into turn four so I just gave it everything and braked later than usual to dive down the outside. I don’t think we touched or anything like that. This is a great result for the team considering how hard the race was.”
As Hamilton had been clear on in his radio message back to the team as he returned to the paddock, the team has a lot of work to do if they are to keep Ferrari at bay. Second best for long periods Sunday and with no answer to the outright pace shown throughout the weekend by Ferrari.
Taking the win in the season opening Grand Prix in Australia, Bottas followed his Mercedes teammate home in second and retains the lead of the championship by a single point by virtue of taking the fastest lap in Australia.
“I think, as a team, we got a bit lucky today but we kept it together and made no mistakes,” said Bottas. “The car was very reliable and that got the win today so the hard work at the factory is paying off so that is good. It was a difficult race for me. The balance of the car was a bit everywhere.”
It seems as though Bottas has come into the 2019 season with a new attitude and his early battle with Hamilton, the two Mercedes getting a lot closer than the team would have wanted, and Bottas was still optimistic when asked about the moves.
“I never will (give Hamilton extra space),” continued Bottas. “The first lap was good. I had a bit of a lockup into turn one, so I lost the place and had a good battle with Lewis.”
For Leclerc, the day was one of what could have been. Leading two of the three practice sessions, all three qualifying sessions and the race by 10 seconds before a power unit problem curtailed his race with just 10 laps to go. The pain was evident on the face of Leclerc but the Monegasque put Sunday down to experience and said that the Ferrari will come back stronger.
“It happens,” said Leclerc. “It’s part of motorsport. Unfortunately, today was not our day but I’m confident the team has done an amazing job to recover the lack of pace in Australia. Of course, I’m disappointed like the whole team but it happens in the season. I think we made the best out of it. We have been lucky in a very unlucky situation because without the safety car at the end, we would have finished in an even more rearward and I don’t think the fuel would have been ok.”
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