Three-time Formula 1 champion Max Verstappen took pole position for the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, ahead of Charles Leclerc and Sergio Perez.

The Red Bull driver produced a lap time of one minute, 27.472 seconds on his first run in Q3 but did not improve on his second attempt so that stood as the time to beat.

Leclerc had only been fourth but with a massive eight tenths down after the first runs, where he had tried an additional warm-up lap to cure a handling problem he was suddenly feeling with new softs.

On his second attempt with just a single warm-up effort, he cut Verstappen’s advantage to 0.319 seconds and beat Checo, who had been unable to go quicker than his first lap in the final segment.

Behind came Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso and the McLaren duo – led by Oscar Piastri throughout Q3 – and the Mercedes drivers.

George Russell ended up ahead of Lewis Hamilton despite making a mistake in the first sector on his final Q3 lap and backing off, with Yuki Tsunoda and Lance Stroll rounding out the top ten.

Q2 was interrupted after four minutes when Nico Hulkenberg stopped in the Turn 8 runoff just has he had begun a first flier in the middle segment where his teammate, Kevin Magnussen had provided a tow.

But Hulkenberg’s VF-24 was already sounding bad, with the Hulk pulling over early in sector one and bringing out the red flags as his Haas had to be recovered.

After a five-minute delay, Q2 built to is conclusion where Oliver Bearman missed the cut by a tiny margin of 0.036 seconds in Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari, with the 18-year-old followed by Alex Albon, Kevin Magnussen and Daniel Ricciardo.

In Q1, Valtteri Bottas was shuffled back to being eliminated in P16 being others improving late in the first segment, where Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly also fell for the second week in a row.

Bottas was left feeling angry at traffic issues late in Q1, with his engineer claiming he was 0.1 seconds up on his personal best in sector one on his last lap, after the Sauber driver was eliminated by 0.072 seconds behind Albon.

This time they ended up off the back row, where Logan Sargeant and Zhou Guanyu will start for Williams and Sauber – the former setting a personal best that was not good enough to progress well ahead of the chequered flag falling.

Zhou only left the pits with one minute, 39 seconds left in Q1 after his massive FP3 shunt, but he did not make it around to start a first flier and he was eliminated in P20 with no time set.

Bearman faces a post-session investigation for apparently failing to respect the race directors’ instruction on the maximum delta time in qualifying when not on a flying lap, in both Q1 and Q2.

So as expected, Max Verstappen qualified on pole position. That Red Bull RB20 is a fast car and it will be interesting if Charles Leclerc can challenge in the race as the Ferrari is on the front row once again.

As for Ollie Bearman, this is fine effort despite a lack of preparation. With Carlos Sainz unable to take part with a health issue, this is a great opportunity for the young driver to make a good impression in Formula 1. To qualify P11 and only one place behind Lewis Hamilton is a good achievement.

Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, qualifying results:
1 Max Verstappen Red Bull 1:27.472
2 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 1:27.791
3 Sergio Perez Red Bull 1:27.807
4 Fernando Alonso Aston Martin 1:27.846
5 Oscar Piastri McLaren 1:28.089
6 Lando Norris McLaren 1:28.132
7 George Russell Mercedes 1:28.316
8 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1:28.460
9 Yuki Tsunoda RB 1:28.547
10 Lance Stroll Aston Martin 1:28.572
11 Ollie Bearman Ferrari 1:28.642
12 Alexander Albon Williams 1:28.980
13 Kevin Magnussen Haas 1:29.020
14 Daniel Ricciardo RB 1:29.025
15 Nico Hulkenberg Haas No time
16 Valtteri Bottas Sauber 1:29.179
17 Esteban Ocon Alpine 1:29.475
18 Pierre Gasly Alpine 1:29.479
19 Logan Sargeant Williams 1:29.526
20 Zhou Guanyu Sauber No time

Three-time world champion Max Verstappen continued his winning form by taking a commannding Bahrain Grand Prix victory, leading home his Red Bull teammate Sergio Perez with a 1-2.

The reigning world champion crossed the finishing line with a 22.4 seconds gap over Perez to clinch his eighth successive Formula 1 win, going back to his Suzuka win last year.

Verstappen faced little in the way of competition, only having to contend with a brief play for the lead from Charles Leclerc into the first corner as the Ferrari driver attempted to make a pass around the outside. But the Red Bull driver held the racing line and kept Leclerc at bay

Although Leclerc may have hoped for some early assistance from the revised DRS regulations, which allows the overtaking aid to be activated from the second lap, Verstappen had already disappeared up the road with an one-second advantage to ensure there were no challenges on the next lap.

Early battles for second gave Verstappen more breathing space and, after George Russell had mounted a pass on Leclerc, the Mercedes was not able to make further inroads and the Red Bull driver extended his lead to three seconds by the end of lap four.

It was a typical Verstappen drive, with relentless consistency and excellent tyre management as Red Bull arguably took a less conservative strategy relative to the other runners; having saved a set of softs from earlier in the weekend, Verstappen and Perez both ran to a soft-hard-soft two-stopper while the others elected to stick to a soft-hard-hard strategy.

Verstappen managed to take his opening stint as far as the end of lap 17 as he became the last driver to pit, but was far enough ahead of Perez – who had since passed Russell for second on lap 14 with an up-and-under overtake into Turn 4 – to maintain a five-second lead.

This grew as Perez faced challenges from Russell and Carlos Sainz behind him, ensuring that Verstappen could focus on maintaining a consistent pace at the head of the field.

He made his final stop on lap 37, switching from his sole set of hard tyres back to the softs, which he was able to press into service for a statement one minute, 32.608 seconds lap before easing back into a strong race pace.

Perez had to spend the race’s second half keeping Sainz at bay, as the Spaniard proved the quicker of the Ferrari drivers throughout the course of the race.

Sainz had earlier reeled off impressive overtakes on team-mate Leclerc and Russell to provisionally occupy a podium position and, although he sometimes had Perez within two seconds, he was unable to make any further inroads towards Checo.

Told on lap 44 that his hard tyres should start to perform more strongly compared to Perez’s softs, Sainz had to settle for third despite an impressive drive especially his inch-perfect racecraft when battling for third place.

Leclerc struggled early on in the race with a series of front lock-ups, notably struggling at Turn 10 as he complained of his car pulling to the right under braking. His later switch to the hard tyres seemed to quell some of those issues, and he managed to dispatch Russell on lap 46 with a move into Turn 11 – Russell had echoed Leclerc’s earlier travails with an off in the previous corner.

Russell’s impressive start to the race could not be carried forward, having had to nurse a suspected power unit issue, which left him having to opt for a lift-and-coast approach through the race, but the Mercedes driver nonetheless beat his McLaren rival Lando Norris into sixth.

Lewis Hamilton could not enjoy the same heroics as Russell early on, as he was largely stuck in lock-step behind Fernando Alonso in the early stages, while fighting the discomfort of a broken seat, but was able to clear Alonso and jump Oscar Piastri in the final round of stops to finish seventh.

Piastri ensured McLaren had both cars in the top eight, while Alonso slipped backwards throughout the race to finish ninth. Lance Stroll recovered from Nico Hulkenberg’s rear-end contact into the first corner to finish in P10 thanks to solid strategy from Aston Martin, which brought him back into the race.

Stroll had been nudged into a spin by Hulkenberg among the Turn 1 contact, which also caught Valtteri Bottas off-guard, but this was the only major moment of note in an incident-free race.

Zhou Guanyu was in with a shout of the final point, having made his first stop early, but could not stop the Astons from making their way through, and thus the Sauber driver had to be content with P11.

Improved race pace ensured that Kevin Magnussen could hold P12 from the chasing RB duo, despite team orders between the drivers; Yuki Tsunoda was asked to move over for Daniel Ricciardo, much to the Yuki’s annoyance, but Ricciardo could not make any further gains on K-Mag.

Alex Albon had to coax an overheating car into P15, ahead of the recovering (and three-stopping) Hulkenberg, while Alpine duo Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly were right at the back with P17 and P18. A damaged Bottas beat Logan Sargeant to P20, as the Williams driver appeared to suffer from a braking issue that forced an off-track excursion at Turn 4 on lap 10.

So this was a reality check for the other teams as the Red Bull RB20 is still the best. Excellent team effort with Max Verstappen winning with teammate Sergio Perez finishing in the runner-up spot.

Bahrain Grand Prix, race results:
1 Max Verstappen Red Bull 1:31:44.742
2 Sergio Perez Red Bull +22.457
3 Carlos Sainz Ferrari +25.110
4 Charles Leclerc Ferrari +39.669
5 George Russell Mercedes +46.788
6 Lando Norris McLaren +48.458
7 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes +50.324
8 Oscar Piastri McLaren +56.082
9 Fernando Alonso Aston Martis +74.887s
10 Lance Stroll Aston Martin +93.216s
11 Zhou Guanyu Sauber +1 lap
12 Kevin Magnussen Haas +1 lap
13 Daniel Ricciardo RB +1 lap
14 Yuki Tsunoda RB +1 lap
15 Alexander Albon Williams +1 lap
16 Nico Hulkenberg Haas +1 lap
17 Esteban Ocon Alpine +1 lap
18 Pierre Gasly Alpine +1 lap
19 Valtteri Bottas Sauber +1 lap
20 Logan Sargeant Williams +2 laps

Three-time world champion Max Verstappen took his first pole position of the new 2024 Formula 1 season, beating Charles Leclerc by 0.228 seconds to mark his place at the front of the Bahrain Grand Prix grid.

The Red Bull driver had taken a back seat during the opening two stages of qualifying but, when it came down to Q3, he set a demanding benchmark with a time of one minute, 29.421 seconds – and then beat his own effort despite the final runs to settle on a time with one minute, 29.179 seconds.

This was slower than Leclerc’s time from Q2, but the Ferrari driver was unable to replicate that effort in the final runs of the Q3 session, and could only manage one minute, 29.407 seconds as Verstappen claimed the best first sector time by two tenths.

George Russell overcame a brief scare in Q2, where he was on the edge of the elimination zone, to find form in Q3 and worked his way up to third on the grid with a time of one minute, 29.485 seconds.

Although Russell was placed under investigation for exceeding the maximum delta time in Q1, no further action was taken and he should retain his starting position on the second row in Saturday’s race.

This put him ahead of Carlos Sainz, as the Ferrari driver looked fast in Q1 but was unable to retain a similar advantage over his Scuderia teammate Leclerc. Regardless, he will start ahead of Red Bull’s Sergio Perez, as he moved up to fifth late on in the Q3 session.

Fernando Alonso will start from sixth, having only completed a single flying lap in Q3 after decided to run in the gap. This lap put him third among the initial runs, but he fell back as the majority of the top ten runners improved in their second efforts.

Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri locked out the fourth row for McLaren, ahead of Lewis Hamilton, who was unable to deliver on the pace he’d shown earlier in the Bahrain weekend and looked out of sorts compared to teammate Russell.

Nico Hulkenberg completed the top ten for Haas, although could not replicate or improve upon the time he had set in Q2.

Yuki Tsunoda and Lance Stroll dropped out of a potential Q3 by late laps by Russell and Hamilton, who delivered under the pressure of needing to find a lap on the second attempt having been stuck in the bottom five.

Although the likes of Tsunoda, Stroll, and Alex Albon all had moments within the top ten, further improvements – including Leclerc’s ride to the top of the order and Hulkenberg’s journey into sixth – shuffled them down the grid order.

Daniel Ricciardo dropped out behind Albon, as Kevin Magnussen could not join his Haas teammate Magnussen in the top ten.

Valtteri Bottas and Zhou Guanyu had both moved their Saubers out of the Q1 drop zone after their second runs, but soon drifted back into the bottom five when other drivers on the edge of elimination had improved.

This also cost Logan Sargeant who had been P12 after the initial runs, but the Williams driver could not improve on his final lap and fell to P18.

This was a nightmare situation for Alpine following a disappointing testing, with both Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly at the bottom of the timesheets throughout the session – with Gasly the only driver outside of a second’s gap to Carlos Sainz’s Q1 headline time.

So an expected, the pre-season favourite is quickest with the nearest challenger alongside. With Max Verstappen and Charles Leclerc on the front row, the race is going to be exciting.

Bahrain Grand Prix qualifying positions:
1 Max Verstappen Red Bull 1:29.179
2 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 1:29.407
3 George Russell Mercedes 1:29.485
4 Carlos Sainz Ferrari 1:29.507
5 Sergio Perez Red Bull 1:29.537
6 Fernando Alonso Aston Martin 1:29.542
7 Lando Norris McLaren 1:29.614
8 Oscar Piastri McLaren 1:29.683
9 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1:29.710
10 Nico Hulkenberg Haas 1:30.502
11 Yuki Tsunoda RB 1:30.129
12 Lance Stroll Aston Martin 1:30.200
13 Alexander Albon Williams 1:30.221
14 Daniel Ricciardo RB 1:30.278
15 Kevin Magnussen Haas 1:30.529
16 Valtteri Bottas Sauber 1:30.756
17 Zhou Guanyu Sauber 1:30.757
18 Logan Sargeant Williams 1:30.770
19 Esteban Ocon Alpine 1:30.793
20 Pierre Gasly Alpine 1:30.948

Red Bull Racing became the final Formula 1 racing team to present their 2024 challenger with the RB20, with some design ideas influenced by rival Mercedes.

This car concept looks similar to the design Mercedes used on 2023 W14, even after it abandoned its ‘zeropod’ sidepod to take up Red Bull’s widely adopted downwash solution.

The RB20 appears to also have a vertical sidepod radiator inlet, under even more heavily undercut sidepods than last year’s RB19.

And yet the car does retain the downwash sidepod concept further down, while its nose and other front-end parts appear similar to those Red Bull was running at the end of last season.

The floor bolted onto the RB20 for the launch event is noticeably bigger and simpler than the complex and critical Venturi tunnel floors required for Formula 1’s current ground-effect rules.

As for the livery, there is no notable differences from the RB19, nor the seven previous Red Bull designs since its current colour scheme was adopted back in 2016, except for the shade of yellow the team incorporated in its livery becoming darker back in 2017.

Speaking at the RB20’s launch, Horner said: “It’s an evolution of last year’s car, obviously, and it’s our 20th version.

“The guys haven’t been [sitting still], it’s not conservative, and you can see they’ve been quite aggressive in certain areas and still pushing the boundaries.

“I’m conscious that our opponents are still pushing very hard and I’ve seen a few cars that have been released that look similar in theme to what we launched with last year.

“You can see that all the men and women behind the scenes have been working very hard [on the RB20] and some of the detail on the car is absolutely exquisite.”

So some interesting aerodynamics on the RB20 as seen by rival Mercedes. which the Brackley-based team abandoned. Would be fascinating if this concept works on the Red Bull.

Mercedes became the penultimate team to launch their 2024 challenger with the W15 and this will be the last Formula 1 racing car that Lewis Hamilton will drive before moving to rival Ferrari next season.

Following the online presentation, the W15 will make its track debut on the short international version of Silverstone, with Hamilton and his teammate George Russell performing a 15km demo run.

This year’s car is hugely significant for the Brackley-based team after two disappointing seasons since the start of the current high downforce regulations era in 2022.

The W13 struggled badly with bouncing and porpoising, and while Russell scored a victory at Interlagos, the team dropped to third in the constructors’ championship.

Last year’s W14 did not represent the hope for step and underwent a major revamp after just a few races.

It failed to take a win in a season dominated by Red Bull and the team scored fewer points than the previous season, although it did move ahead of Ferrari to claim second in the constructors’ championship.

The team underwent a restructuring, with Mike Elliott moving to the role of chief technical officer and James Allison swapping job title and returning to frontline action as technical director. Elliott subsequently left the team later.

The W15 is thus the first car designed and developed overseen by Allison, and it represents a major change from its predecessor as the team attempts to close the gap to pacesetters Red Bull Racing.

“We’re changing the concept,” team principal Toto Wolff noted recently. “We’re completely moving away from how we laid out the chassis, the weight distribution, the airflow.

“Literally there’s almost every component being changed because only by doing that, I think we have a chance.

“We could get it wrong also. So between not gaining what we expect, to catching up and making a big step, and competing at the front, anything is possible.”

The W15 certainly looks nice with silver and black on the livery. Hopefully this car is fast and can finally give a victory for Hamilton.

We’ve seen the livery previously and now McLaren has revealed their 2024 Formula 1 racing car, the MCL38, at Woking.

McLaren has stuck to its popular papaya orange and black colour scheme for the new Formula 1 season.

This new car is buildt on the much-improved MCL60 which, after a slow start, came alive thanks to several mid-season upgrades last year.

It is the first car fully overseen from its conception by team boss Andrea Stella and his new technical structure at Woking, which enabled it to move up to fourth in the 2023 constructors’ championship, and it also the first product from McLaren’s brand-new wind tunnel.

With further high-profile recruits on board, including Red Bull Racing’s Rob Marshall and Scuderia Ferrari’s David Sanchez, McLaren hopes to improve on last year’s eight podiums between Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri after often having the second-quickest car behind Red Bull across the final third of last year.

“Going into this year, we look to build on the momentum of last season but are realistic in the knowledge that every team will have made progress and found competitiveness for their 2024 cars,” Stella said.

“We now have everything in place from an infrastructure, people and culture perspective so we continue to push forward and build on the work done to get us back to front of the grid.

“Before we hit the track for competitive sessions, we have a lot of work to do, including putting the MCL38 through its paces during the Bahrain pre-season test. The team has done a good job over the winter, and we are confident we can hit the ground running, but we know we have important tasks at hand before the season starts.

“There are a number of innovations on the car, but not all the areas we want to address have been completed for our launch-spec car. Those areas now become the focus of our in-season development, which is already in progress.

The new MCL38 certainly looks promising. Let’s see if this car can provide regular points finishes and hopefully Norris can finally win a Grand Prix race.

Scuderia Ferrari revealed their 2024 Formula 1 challenger, the SF24, with an online launch event from its Maranello base.

The Italian team is heading into the upcoming season with a sense of reinvigoration following the news that seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton will be joining Ferrari in 2025.

That high-profile signing is a series of positive steps of what has been nicknamed ‘Operation Relaunch’ as Ferrari CEO John Elkann and team principal Fred Vasseur plot the Scuderia’s route back to the front of the grid.

In the SF-24, Ferrari hopes to make amends for some of the problems that held back Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz last year.

While the team’s 2023 car proved super-fast over a single lap in qualifying, it could not extract anywhere near the race pace and consistency of the benchmark Red Bull.

In the end, the team managed just a single victory, thanks to Sainz’s success at the Singapore Grand Prix.

Ferrari hopes that the developments made to the SF-24 will help it make good progress on this front and reduce the peaky-aerodynamic performance that was one of the key factors that overshadowed its Formula 1 efforts throughout last season.

The classic red certainly makes the Ferrari look beautiful. Hopefully this SF-24 can challenge for regular wins and go for championship glory this season.

Aston Martin presented their new AMR24, which is described as a “strong evolution” of its 2023 Formula 1 race car.

The Silverstone-based team is coming off the back of mixed fortunes last year where a super strong start to the season was followed by a period of difficulty as it struggled to get the most out of upgrades.

But having understood what went wrong with its development direction, the team has made amends for its 2024 car which it hope can challenge for regular points finishes.

The AMR24 has been refined in almost all areas but has some noticeable differences compared to last year’s chassis – including its nose and front wing to help improve outwash.

As well as the aerodynamic changes, Aston Martin is switching to a push-rod rear suspension configuration as a result of it taking Mercedes customer parts.

Technical director Dan Fallows is clear, however, that the team has not embarked on a totally different direction.

“We’ve made changes all over the car,” he said. “It’s very different in many ways.

“The majority of the parts have changed on it, but it is still really essentially a strong evolution of last year’s car. We have kind of built on the end of AMR23.

“The obvious things that you’ll see that are different, are things like the nose and front wing. Bodywork will be different. But there’s also quite a lot of stuff under the hood, which hopefully you won’t see! We will obviously try and keep some of that under wraps.”

It certainly looks good. Let’s hope Fernando Alonso can regular fight for top positions with this new car. Plus, Aston Martin will be hoping to mix it with more frequently to improve their fifth place finish in last year’s constructors’ standings.

The rebranded RB team presented their 2024 Formula 1 racing car at a special launch event on the Las Vegas Boulevard.

It follows a significant change for the Faenza-based outfit, featuring a new team principal and new identity for the upcoming season.

The blue, black and white challenger brings back familiar colours as seen in Toro Rosso era and yet features new title sponsors Visa and Cash App.

On the technical side, the VCARB 01 has some interesting changes that have brought it closer to sister team Red Bull’s concept, having been open about there being closer collaboration for this year.

After opting to run Red Bull-designed rear suspension from last year’s Singapore Grand Prix, RB has now also switched to a pull-rod front suspension layout for this season.

This brings it fully in line with the configuration that Red Bull Racing has put to good use in Formula 1 after winning both the drivers’ and constructors’ titles under the new ground effect rules.

It has a new management structure, with CEO Peter Bayer and team principal Laurent Mekies running the operation.

The driver line up remains the same, with Daniel Ricciardo and Yuki Tsunoda on duty, and as they hope to improve on the eighth-place finish that the outfit managed in last year’s constructors’ championship.

Speaking at the end of last season, Ricciardo felt that the changes at the team had moved RB away from being viewed as simply a place for Red Bull to develop young drivers.

“I feel like we’re going in the right direction,” said Ricciardo. “And honestly, everything I fed back to the team, I feel like they’ve actioned or done their best to make it happen or make it work.

“So honestly I can’t ask for too much more at the moment. It’s obviously now just how quickly can we get new parts on the car, and this and that.

“I would say, I don’t want to be like patronising, but their heads are in the right place. I feel like we’re all kind of meeting in the right place and looking ahead. I think they value the experience I have, and I think that’s really important kind of moving forward, and they’re motivated.

“I feel like this is not a junior team anymore.”

Hopefully this car can regular finish in the points and the new colours scheme is certainly refreshing after a series of black, carbon fibre liveries from the other cars revealed so far.

Alpine becomes the latest Formula 1 team to launch its 2024 race car featuring a collaboration with artist Felipe Pantone.

The livery still has that familiar combination of blue, pink and naked carbon black look and will be driven this year by Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly.

In a season launch at Enstone, that also included the unveiling of its hypercar for the World Endurance Championship, Alpine revealed the challenger that should help it return to the front of the midfield after dropping from fourth to sixth last season.

As was the case in previous seasons, Alpine will race with a predominantly blue car at the majority of the 24 Grands Prix, but will switch to a pink livery at an expanded eight races to promote its main sponsor BWT.

The team says the A524 is a “brand-new concept created for the next two seasons and is marked by innovative solutions as a result of learnings from previous iterations.

“The bold approach will allow the team to apply a stronger development path across the next two campaigns.”

Technical director Matt Harman said: “The A524 approach has been aggressive but deliberate in the fact we are creating a wider scope to add performance to the car. We have really focused on learning and reacting to what we have learnt rather than on results.

“The project has been bold where we have focused on realising concepts, which we aim to add to the car. We’ve built ourselves a strong platform to add performance when we can and we have set ourselves targets to deliver those.”

The new Alpine certainly looks nice and it will be interesting if the car can regular score points to move up the competitive order this upcoming championship.