Pos. Car Driver Team Model Best time Gap Laps

1 1 Max Verstappen Red Bull RB19 1’32.837 157

2 14 Fernando Alonso Aston Martin AMR23 1’32.866 0.029 60

3 55 Carlos Sainz Jnr Ferrari SF-23 1’33.253 0.416 72

4 16 Charles Leclerc Ferrari SF-23 1’33.267 0.430 64

5 4 Lando Norris McLaren MCL60 1’33.462 0.625 40

6 44 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes W14 1’33.508 0.671 83

7 23 Alexander Albon Williams FW45 1’33.671 0.834 74

8 24 Zhou Guanyu Alfa Romeo C43 1’33.723 0.886 67

9 63 George Russell Mercedes W14 1’34.174 1.337 69

10 2 Logan Sargeant Williams FW45 1’34.324 1.487 75

11 27 Nico Hulkenberg Haas VF-23 1’34.424 1.587 51

12 77 Valtteri Bottas Alfa Romeo C43 1’34.558 1.721 71

13 21 Nyck de Vries AlphaTauri AT04 1’34.559 1.722 85

14 34 Felipe Drugovich Aston Martin AMR23 1’34.564 1.727 40

15 22 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri AT04 1’34.671 1.834 46

16 10 Pierre Gasly Alpine A523 1’34.822 1.985 60

17 31 Esteban Ocon Alpine A523 1’34.871 2.034 53

18 81 Oscar Piastri McLaren MCL60 1’34.888 2.051 52

19 20 Kevin Magnussen Haas VF-23 1’35.087 2.250 57

 

 

 

 

Day 2 and signs of performance are starting to show.

Looks like another tough year for Mercedes and McLaren. And the Aston Martin is looking good

 

 

Pos. Car number Driver Team Model Best time Gap Laps

1 24 Zhou Guanyu Alfa Romeo C43 1’31.610 133

2 1 Max Verstappen Red Bull RB19 1’31.650 0.040 47

3 14 Fernando Alonso Aston Martin AMR23 1’32.205 0.595 130

4 21 Nyck de Vries AlphaTauri AT04 1’32.222 0.612 74

5 27 Nico Hulkenberg Haas VF-23 1’32.466 0.856 68

6 55 Carlos Sainz Jnr Ferrari SF-23 1’32.486 0.876 70

7 2 Logan Sargeant Williams FW45 1’32.549 0.939 154

8 16 Charles Leclerc Ferrari SF-23 1’32.725 1.115 68

9 81 Oscar Piastri McLaren MCL60 1’33.175 1.565 74

10 10 Pierre Gasly Alpine A523 1’33.186 1.576 59

11 20 Kevin Magnussen Haas VF-23 1’33.442 1.832 67

12 31 Esteban Ocon Alpine A523 1’33.490 1.880 49

13 63 George Russell Mercedes W14 1’33.654 2.044 26

14 11 Sergio Perez Red Bull RB19 1’33.751 2.141 76

15 44 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes W14 1’33.954 2.344 72

16 4 Lando Norris McLaren MCL60 1’35.522 3.912 65

17 22 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri AT04 1’35.708 4.098 85

@1628384066092269575

So following the meaningful end of the 3 day test I'd estimate this as the relative pecking order for the start of the year -

 

Red Bull - look clearly the quickest

Ferrari - Closer than the end of last year but not much

Mercedes - poor handling but has potential and pace

Aston Martin - Possibly better than the Merc but looks close on pace.

Haas - Looked comfortable and confident

Alfa Romeo - Solid

Alpha Tauri - Any of these and Alfa or Haas could be switched. Midfield looks tight here

Alpine - Team looked confident but the car looked tricky to handle (maybe they're hiding something)

McLaren - Beset with problems and looked a handful. Could end up struggling

Williams - Will shine at some circuits but looks set for the back end of the grid.

 

 

 

McLaren were awful at the start of last season but got it together and should have finished 4th in the standings if Ricciardo was even close to Norris.

 

Aston Martin always flatter to deceive but with Alonso at the wheel they could be a shout for 4th.

 

Should be another comfortable championship for Max. Maybe only 14 wins this season...

Idk how to take Alpine. They have a solid base car from 22 and the A523 looks on paper like a good step and the Engine should be capable of taking on the rest quite comfortably. I haven’t seen tyre compound breakdowns so I don’t know if they actually put the sprint on at any point today

McLaren were awful at the start of last season but got it together and should have finished 4th in the standings if Ricciardo was even close to Norris.

 

Aston Martin always flatter to deceive but with Alonso at the wheel they could be a shout for 4th.

 

Should be another comfortable championship for Max. Maybe only 14 wins this season...

The McLaren situation looks totally different this year though. In 2022 they had a break problem in pre-season/Bahrain GP but that was quickly resolved and they were comfortably 4th best car thereafter. Here it just looks bad. I'm sure they'll improve eventually though.

 

As for the AM, it just looks very, very good. Alonso on like for like fuel/tyre set up was as fast as Sainz. It was the car the whole paddock was talking up and in regards to last year they were poor in pre-season. Vettel spent nearly two days up on the jacks

Edited February 26, 20232 yr by Severin

Idk how to take Alpine. They have a solid base car from 22 and the A523 looks on paper like a good step and the Engine should be capable of taking on the rest quite comfortably. I haven’t seen tyre compound breakdowns so I don’t know if they actually put the sprint on at any point today

Hardest car to judge I feel. Looks very stiff and this could be very capable at somewhere like Austin or Jeddha but struggle on a lot of circuits. Plus they have a weak driver line up.

 

On the flip they're getting upgrades next week

Lance Stroll will be replaced by Aston Martin reserve driver Felipe Drugovich if the Canadian is not fit enough to race in the Bahrain Grand Prix.

 

Team principal Mike Krack had refused to rule out the possibility of Sebastian Vettel making a shock return from retirement to fill in for Stroll.

 

But on Sunday the team said Drugovich would race if Stroll does not recover from injury before next weekend.

 

The 22-year-old Brazilian drove the car in pre-season testing this week.

 

Stroll injured his wrist in what the team described as a "minor" cycling accident last week and was forced to sit out the three days of pre-season testing on Thursday, Friday and Saturday.

 

He is due to try driving in the team's simulator as a first step to evaluating whether he will be able to compete in Bahrain on 3-5 March.

The 2023 race will be the 20th running of a Grand Prix in Bahrain. 19 "Bahrain" GPs and 1 "Sakhir" GP.

 

 

Who do you think will win the Bahrain Grand Prix?

Verstappen. Interestingly its one of the only tracks on the calendar he's never won before!

Some random prds to look back and laugh on at the seasons end:

 

- Red Bull will absolutely dominate the season winning 19 races, 17 for Max and 2 for Perez

- Ferrari will be behind RB to start with but close the gap and win 3 races (all Leclerc)

- Mercedes will have a disaster (sad face) and not win a single race, Russell finishes above Hamilton again in the standings

- Alpine will be comfortably mid-pack and there won't be any on track scuffles between the drivers, Ocon beats Gasly in the standings

- McLaren will start the season slow but bounce back and Norris will nick a win in a crazy race (Hungary 21 style), Piastri will finish above him in the standings though

- Alfa Romeo will start solid but fall to the back of midfield like last season, Bottas narrowly beats Zhou in the standings

- Aston Martin will jump to the front of the midfield and Alonso/Stroll both get a podium at some point, Alonso will have numerous retirements though

- Haas will be constantly fighting for points and there will be a on-track scuffle between the drivers, Hulk beats Magnussen

- Alpha Tauri will struggle and rarely get points, Tsunoda gets dropped mid season and is replaced by Ricciardo who impresses instantly

- Williams will bring up the rear but Albon impresses again, including a top 5 finish

First Practice Standings:

 

1. Sergio Perez (Mexico) [Red Bull] 1:32.758

2. Fernando Alonso (Spain) [Aston Martin] +0.438

3. Max Verstappen (Netherlands) [Red Bull] +0.617

4. Lando Norris (Great Britain) [McLaren] +1.407

5. Charles Leclerc (Monaco) [Ferrari] +1.499

6. Lance Stroll (Canada) [Aston Martin] +1.540

7. Kevin Magnuseen (Denmark) [Haas] +1.644

8. Zhou Guanyu (China) [Alfa Romeo] +1.817

9. Valtteri Bottas (Finland) [Alfa Romeo] +1.931

10. Lewis Hamilton (Great Britain) [Mercedes] +2.159

11. George Russell (Great Britain) [Mercedes] +2.208

12. Oscar Piastri (Australia) [McLaren] +2.239

13. Yuki Tsunoda (Japan) [AlphaTauri] +2.257

14. Nico Hulkenberg (Germany) [Haas] +2.285

15. Esteban Ocon (France) [Alpine] +2.347

16. Nyck de Vries (Netherlands) [AlphaTauri] +2.644

17. Pierre Gasly (France) [Alpine] +2.697

18. Logan Sargeant (USA) [Williams] +2.991

19. Alex Albon (Thailand) [Williams] +3.260

20. Carlos Sainz Jr (Spain) [Ferrari] +3.314

First session in representative conditions so gonna be interesting to see the quali sims and then the longer runs even though there’s gonna be a lot of masking of pace with engine modes etc.

Alpine has finally worked out which pedal is the accelerator and given it a firm press. Looks in the mix. Should be an interesting season

So having seen a bit more of each teams form -

 

Red Bull - Title's theirs to lose but for the second year in a row Perez looking more comfortable in the car than Max... but talent will win out.

Aston Martin - Looking second best by a whisker in Alonso's hands whilst Lance's is broken so hard to judge whether it's second or third best

Ferrari - Definitely hiding their pace but at best their second.

Mercedes - probably sit here but in the end but look like their just slow.

Haas - Decent car

Alpine - Very stiff car that will be great at times. Probably upper midfield to dead centre based on the track

Alfa Romeo - Solid

McLaren - Could be here but could be the Norris factor. Still hard to judge how good he is

Alpha Tauri - Midfield looks tight here and circuit dependent but see them in the back half generally

Williams - Will shine at some circuits but looks set for the back end of the grid and fighting with AT.

 

 

 

 

 

Predictions -

 

WDC - Verstappen

WCC - Red Bull

Race winners - Verstappen, Perez, Leclerc, Alonso, Sainz

Pole winners - Verstappen, Perez, Leclerc, Alonso, Sainz, Norris

Hamilton to announce retirement date

Andretti to acquire Alpha Tauri

Enjoyed watching that qualifying session, an expected result but possibly closer than anticipated and built up nicely. Good work from Aston to have got a car up to that level. Think it's positive to have 5 different teams out in Q1 too, don't want to see one team well off it, have a proper battle from 5th downwards.

At some points the spreads looked a little tighter than last year. So I feel like we are moving generally in the right direction

 

 

But I see that Merc are back to their sandbagging bullshit

Merc are nowhere, 4th fastest car.

 

Red Bull will dominate this season.

The Hulk nailed his return qualifying!!!