Leclerc snatches pole for season opener, Sainz P3 in promising start for Ferrari; Red Bull’s reigning champ Verstappen qualifies P2, Hamilton only P5 as Mercedes struggle
The real beginning of Formula 1’s latest new era yielded a multitude of surprises, as the teams put the completely redesigned cars on display for the first time in earnest during Saturday Qualifying for tomorrow’s season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix. With a radical new set of rules changing the look and design of the cars, most notably in cutting down on the complexity of the wings and exterior aero elements for less downforce but with a renewed emphasis on ground effects to stick the chassis to the road surface in exchange, it was the first opportunity to see which teams came out of the box strong and which still had work yet to do. And the answer appears to be that Ferrari has made the biggest improvements under the new regulations and the famed team from Maranello could well be geared up for a mano a mano brawl with Red Bull and their reigning champion, Max Verstappen, for the big prizes at the end of the year. Obviously, one swallow does not make a spring, but Charles Leclerc was able to put his blood red Prancing Horse on pole under the lights at the Bahrain International Circuit, besting Verstappen’s vaunted Adrian Newey-designed Red Bull RB18 at the line by a relatively hefty .123-seconds. Confirming the potential power of the new Ferrari design, Leclerc’s teammate Carlos Sainz was also in contain for the pole, though in the end he slotted in at P3 just barely of Verstappen’s pace. Meanwhile, the Dutch champ’s Ref Bull teammate, Sergio Perez, looked set to reprise his pivotal wingman role once again in 2022, as the Mexican veteran could manage no better than the fourth fastest lap in the face of the Prancing Horses’ rediscovered competitiveness.
The inverse of Ferrari’s resurgent good fortune was the poor debut performance of the normally mighty Mercedes new W13 chassis. With the new ground effects also come new aero headaches and Mercedes have suffered from severe oscillations, aka “porpoising”, throughput testing and in these first days of practice. While the team’s braintrust were able to dial out some of that, especially on their seven-time champion Lewis Hamilton’s mount, Hamilton could still do no better than a P5 start for tomorrow’s race. To say the least, that is an unfamiliar position for the Briton, who frankly dominated the just completed hybrid era until the ascendence of Verstappen and his controversial championship-clinching win to end the 2021 campaign in Abu Dhabi last December. Worse still for the eight-time consecutive Constructors’ Champions, their new number two, England’s young George Russell, suffered the ignominy of qualifying down in P9, about where he would normally end up in the pokey Williams last year. If that wasn’t disheartening enough, the previous Merc second banana, Valtteri Bottas, out-qualified Russell in P6 with his new team, the Ferrari-powered Alfa Romeo. In fact, Ferrari power looked like this first weekend’s winner already, with not only Bottas keeping his Q3 streak alive at Alfa but also Kevin Magnussen marking his return to F1 with a brilliant effort to capture P7 on the grid for perpetual back marker Haas despite battling hydraulic issues. and it was a very promising day for the Scuderia on the power plant front. On the other side off the engine equation, all four Mercedes-powered McLarens and Aston Martins failed to make it into the final qualifying round. Savvy veteran Fernando Alonso willed his Alpine Renault into P8 with a fine final effort while the Red Bull (Honda)-powered AlphaTauri of Pierre Gasly struggled with overall handling rand could do no better than P10.
Top 10 qualifiers for the Bahrain GP:
| POS | DRIVER | Q1 | Q2 | Q3 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1:31.471 | 1:30.932 | 1:30.558 | |
| 2 | 1:31.785 | 1:30.757 | 1:30.681 | |
| 3 | 1:31.567 | 1:30.787 | 1:30.687 | |
| 4 | 1:32.311 | 1:31.008 | 1:30.921 | |
| 5 | 1:32.285 | 1:31.048 | 1:31.238 | |
| 6 | 1:31.919 | 1:31.717 | 1:31.560 | |
| 7 | 1:31.955 | 1:31.461 | 1:31.808 | |
| 8 | 1:32.346 | 1:31.621 | 1:32.195 | |
| 9 | 1:32.269 | 1:31.252 | 1:32.216 | |
| 10 | 1:32.096 | 1:31.635 | 1:32.338 |
Complete qualifying results available via Formula1.com.
Tomorrow’s race airs live on ESPN here in the States beginning at 11AM Eastern here in the States. Can Ferrari set the pace over the course of a full Grand Prix or will Verstappen’s superlative skills where down the Prancing Horses and deny them victory? And just how much pain will Mercedes take tomorrow as the team focuses on early season damage limitation? Look forward to seeing you then to find out how it all shakes out in the 2022 opener!