McLaren’s Piastri rockets to dominant pole in Bahrain but teammate Norris fumbles final effort en route to P6; Mercedes’ Russell and Antonelli qualify P2 & P4 but penalized one spot each for pit infractions; Leclerc elevated to second on grid; Verstappen and Red Bull nowhere

A week after being thoroughly outperformed by Red Bull’s Max Verstappen at the Japanese Grand Prix, the McLaren duo of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri were keen to reassert their dominance during Saturday Qualifying for the Bahrain Grand Prix. But it ended up only Piastri who flew the Papaya flag by laying down a stunning marker here at the very tricky and twisty 5.4 kilometer Bahrain International Circuit, blasting his way to a dominant pole position, some two-tenths ahead of his closest pursuer, Mercedes’ George Russell. Meanwhile, Piastri’s normally superlative McLaren teammate, Lando Norris, failed to get the best out of his MCL39 and to come to grips with the windy conditions in the desert and could only manage P6 on his final flier in Q3, over four-tenths behind his pole-sitting teammate. While it is certainly more possible to pass here than at what ended up a stagnant Suzuka circuit last week, Piastri will have a major advantage getting away from the point while Norris has to fight his way through a quartet of fairly fast drivers to get back on terms for a win. Piastri will certainly be looking to maximize that advantage and take a victory that would vault him ahead of Norris for the points lead. Game on.

Mercedes were impressive and were definitely the next best team on pace here, just ahead of Ferrari and well ahead of the struggling Red Bull duo. But, while Russell was hyper-competitive with a P2 effort and rookie teammate Kimi Antonelli excelled to slot in at P4, the team were penalized for a pit lane infraction under Red Flag conditions after Haas’s Esteban Ocon had a major crash earlier in Q2. Both drivers were docked a grid place for the team’s error in sending them info the fast lane prematurely while the medical car was still driving to the front of the pits after Ocon had been dropped off for examination, big no-no. That elevated Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc to second on the grid and Alpine’s Pierre Gasly, who had a genuinely superb qualifying effort regardless, up to the second row and P4. Meanwhile, a week after their surprise victory in Japan, Red Bull were nowhere in Bahrain, with both Verstappen and Tsunoda struggling mightily with balance and breaking. It all ended up with a humbling P7 effort for last week’s winner Verstappen, with Tsunoda at least making it to Q3 for the first time in tow tries, albeit with only the tenth fastest time.

Carlos Sainz appeared to finally get the handle on his Williams with a very solid P8 result, but Lewis Hamilton again struggled in his Prancing Horse and could manage no better than an underwhelming P9.

Top 10 qualifiers for the Bahrain GP:

Complete qualifying results available via Formula1.com.

The adjusted grid after Mercedes’ penalties are factored in is here. 

After a raft of overnighters to start the season, tomorrow’s race airs at the perfectly decent time of 11AM Eastern on ESPN2 here in the States. With a supreme advantage over his teammate and the rest of the field, Piastri will be looking to both stamp his authority on the race from the get go and then vault himself ahead of Norris in the Championship by dint of the victory. But do the Mercedes duo of Russell and Antonelli have anything to spring an upset when the lights go out, even from their slightly demoted positions? Hope to see you then to find out how it all shakes out!