Category: Formula 1

• Dutchman finished sixth at Sakhir circuit
• Horner says team need to react ‘very quickly’

Senior figures at Red Bull held crisis talks after the Bahrain Grand Prix finished with a deeply dissatisfied Max Verstappen languishing in sixth place. But the team principal, ­Christian Horner, admitted there will be no quick fix.

Horner conceded the team have problems that need to be addressed as soon as possible, but he said: “This race has exposed some pitfalls that are obviously very clear that we need to get on top of very quickly. Ultimately you can mask it a little through setup and we were able to achieve that last weekend in Suzuka. We understand where the issues are, it’s introducing the solutions that obviously take a little more time.”

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• Australian leads from pole to flag to pick up second win of season
• ‘It was relatively straightforward,’ says McLaren driver

Australian Oscar Piastri hailed an “incredible weekend” after earning another pole-to-flag Formula One triumph at the Bahrain Grand Prix. The McLaren driver made his 50th grand prix start on Sunday and moved into second place in the drivers’ standings with the victory, which left him breathing down the neck of his low-on-confidence teammate Lando Norris.

After he held off a challenge on the first corner from Mercedes’ George Russell at the floodlit Sakhir circuit, Piastri then utterly dominated, even after a mid-race restart under the safety car. The man from Melbourne, the first driver to win two grand prix this season after his Chinese GP victory, ended up outpacing Russell by 15-and-a-half seconds – the biggest margin of victory by any winner this year – with championship leader Norris third.

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• Briton third behind teammate Piastri and Russell
• Norris: ‘I’m nowhere near the capability I have’

Lando Norris has insisted he remains confident in his abilities, even as he admitted he has no answer as to what he can do to work better with his McLaren car after a difficult weekend. The British driver, soundly beaten at he Bahrain Grand Prix by his teammate Oscar Piastri, said he is hurt by the frustration he feels.

Norris finished third at the Sakhir circuit, behind Piastri who took the flag a full 15 seconds up the road from Mercedes’ George Russell in second. After qualifying poorly in sixth, a performance he admitted left him “clueless”, an exasperated Norris felt he was no closer to getting to grips with the car after the race.

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• George Russell finishes second; Lando Norris third
• Ferrari’s Leclerc and Hamilton take fourth and fifth

Flawless was the assessment of Oscar Piastri’s race engineer after the Australian delivered a consummate victory at the Bahrain Grand Prix. Calm and controlled throughout, this was a champion’s drive from Piastri that has made it abundantly clear he is in contention to return the championship this season.

Tom Stallard, a 2008 Olympic rowing silver medallist for Great Britain, is Piastri’s engineer but the Australian, unflappable, barely needed so much as a gentle nudge from him all race, such was the ease with which he drove from pole to flag to take McLaren’s first victory at the Sakhir circuit.

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Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri have a chance to dominate in the desert as Max Verstappen scrambles to stay in touch

Three races into the new Formula One season and this weekend’s ­Bahrain Grand Prix represents something of a litmus test as to what may ­follow for the title protagonists. Everything points to a chance for McLaren to dominate at the Sakhir circuit but there may also be some indication if Red Bull are making real steps ­forward with their car.

For McLaren, Bahrain is a chance to throw off their hoodoo at the track where they have never won and at which, in recent years, they have struggled for form. This season in testing at the circuit they gave their first evidence that they had a much improved package; one swiftly ­reinforced with dominant victories for Lando Norris in Australia and then his teammate, Oscar Piastri, in China.

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• Reid has had disagreements with Mohammed Ben Sulayem
• ‘Motorsport deserves leadership that is accountable’

The FIA has been rocked by another executive resignation with a very senior figure joining the chorus of dissatisfaction directed at how Formula One’s governing body is run and the organisation’s president, Mohammed Ben Sulayem.

On Thursday, the FIA’s deputy president for sport, Robert Reid, announced his resignation citing what he called “a fundamental breakdown in governance standards” and “critical decisions being made without due process”.

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• Australian finishes third behind teammate Lando Norris at Suzuka
• Piastri’s request to swap places with Norris was turned down

Oscar Piastri has said he has no complaints about McLaren rejecting his request to shoot for glory at the Japanese Grand Prix.

The Australian finished third behind teammate Lando Norris and victor Max Verstappen on Sunday, but he believed he had possessed the pace to get past the Red Bull champion and possibly make it back-to-back F1 wins following his victory in China.

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The dismissal of the New Zealander and his replacement by the more experienced Yuki Tsunoda illustrates fundamental problems with the RB21

Red Bull’s dismissal of Liam Lawson after only two races was a ruthless decision, brutal even by their standards. Yet while it was neither unexpected nor particularly surprising, there is more to it than simple dissatisfaction with an underperforming driver. Replacing him with Yuki Tsunoda was a U-turn that indicates fundamental problems the team are facing, ones to which they are unlikely to find a quick fix, and that Max Verstappen is unhappy at their performance and indeed their prospects for the new season.

Lawson, who had already looked shell-shocked by the close of the second race in China last weekend, was left entreating the team to give him just a little more time. Red Bull were not forthcoming. On Thursday morning they announced he would be replaced by Tsunoda from their sister team, RB, the Japanese driver having originally been passed over for the seat in Lawson’s favour at the end of last season.

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• Champion likes post describing change as ‘panic move’
• Rookie Lawson will go back to sister team RB for season

Max Verstappen has indicated disquiet and dismay with his Red Bull team after they confirmed they will replace their driver Liam Lawson with Yuki Tsunoda from sister team RB.

Lawson has been dropped for the season before next weekend’s Japanese Grand Prix after the New Zealander completed only two races for the team, while Verstappen remains dissatisfied with the team’s performance and their failure to bring a competitive car to the new season.

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• Lawson failed to earn a point in first two races of 2025
• New Zealander to swap seats with Racing Bulls’ driver

Red Bull are poised to replace Liam Lawson with Yuki Tsunoda after just two races of the Formula One season. Tsunoda would join Max Verstappen for his home grand prix in Japan next week, with Lawson likely returning to the Racing Bulls feeder team.

Lawson was promoted from Racing Bulls to replace Mexican driver Sergio Pérez but has struggled in his first two race weekends in Australia and China. The 23-year-old New Zealander was with Tsunoda in Red Bull’s feeder team for six races last season, after being drafted in as replacement for Daniel Ricciardo.

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Embarrassing disqualification of Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc raises difficult questions for Scuderia

Before the Formula One season began Lewis Hamilton had taken his motorhome to Ferrari’s Maranello factory, living alongside his new colleagues in order to bond with them and better learn their methodologies in an effort to make his transition into the Scuderia as seamless as possible. After he and his teammate, Charles Leclerc, were disqualified from the Chinese Grand Prix on Sunday, he may have to consider taking up residence again, as a rocked Ferrari deal with a disheartening opening to the season.

Ferrari have never endured a double disqualification before in the 75 years they have participated in F1, an embarrassment for which they held up their hands. They conceded that the skid block on the floor of Hamilton’s car had been worn 0.5mm below the limit, while Leclerc’s ride was 1kg below the minimum weight requirement. The F1 governing body, the FIA, said Ferrari acknowledged a “genuine error” and the team said it was a “mistake” they would endeavour not to repeat.

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• McLaren pair had 1-2 finish in Chinese GP on Sunday
• Norris: ‘We’re two competitors who both want to win’

Lando Norris says his McLaren team will be “nervous” about the prospect of him going head-to-head with his teammate, Oscar Piastri, for the F1 title. Norris and Piastri have one victory each after the opening two rounds of the Formula One season.

The British team, seeking their first world champion since Lewis Hamilton claimed his maiden crown in 2008, have said their drivers are free to race each other. Although Norris has claimed McLaren are prepared for an intra-team duel, he acknowledged there could be bumps along the road.

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• Piastri wins Chinese GP from pole for first win of season
• ‘I feel like I deserved from last week,’ he says

Oscar Piastri was full of praise for his team after a triumphant weekend during which he redeemed himself from a nightmare end in Melbourne a week ago by emphatically winning the Chinese Grand Prix from pole.

The McLaren flyer never gave up the lead he earned in qualifying in Shanghai to win the third GP of his burgeoning career on Sunday. It adds to his triumphs in Hungary and Azerbaijan last year in what was a breakout season for the 23-year-old.

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• Team say they will learn from mistakes at Chinese GP
• Hamilton’s sixth place undone in second race for Ferrari

Ferrari have admitted they were at fault for the mistakes that led to the disqualification of both their drivers, Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc, from the Chinese Grand Prix on Sunday, in what was a disastrous close to the weekend for the Scuderia and a hugely disappointing outcome for Hamilton in only his second race for the team.

Leclerc and Hamilton had finished fifth and sixth respectively in the race, which was won by McLaren’s Oscar Piastri. However three hours after the flag, and in the wake of the usual post‑race inspection of the cars to ensure they are in compliance with regulations, Ferrari were found wanting over two clearly defined rules.

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• Australian first, with McLaren teammate Norris second
• Ferrari’s Hamilton and Leclerc disqualified after race

Now 18 years into his career and hoping to see it out with a flourish, it will not have gone unnoticed by Lewis Hamilton that while McLaren – with whom he started in Formula One all those years ago – are enjoying a breathless, heady run of form, his opening with Ferrari has been an altogether more frustrating affair. The teams’ fates in the Chinese Grand Prix could not have been in greater contrast and it is doubtful that it would give Hamilton occasion for so much as a wry smile.

In a processional race at Shanghai, McLaren’s Oscar Piastri won with a commanding drive from pole and with his teammate Lando Norris behind him they secured McLaren’s 50th one-two finish and the team’s first of the season. On this form, it will not be the last.

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