Not Always Black-and-White
A recap of the 2025 Bahrain Grand Prix
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After the glorified procession of Suzuka, the race in Bahrain offered an opportunity for real racing to occur. Fortunately, the race largely delivered. It may not have been the most entertaining race of the season so far, but at least it was a race.
Having said that, if you’re hoping Bahrain is a sign that Suzuka was a one-off, I would urge you not to put all your eggs in one basket. That’s not to say I wouldn’t hope so myself. It’s just that things are not always black-and-white—besides the checkered flag, of course.
Lando Norris’ Bahrain weekend shows multiple things can be true at once.
Oscar Piastri: 1st (Qualified 1st)
Lando Norris: 3rd (Qualified 6th)
Piastri became the first multiple-pole sitter and race winner in Bahrain and moved up to second in the Drivers’ Championship with another textbook, controlled performance from start to finish. But it was his championship-leading teammate who dominated headlines.
Norris has made it clear since the start of the season in Australia that the McLaren, while a fast car, is not suited towards his driving style and has forced him to constantly adjust how he drives. Those struggles were on full display in Bahrain, where a dejected Norris self-deprecatingly claimed after qualifying in 6th place it felt like “he had never driven an F1 car before.” A recovery up to the podium on Sunday was hampered by the fact Norris could have actually finished higher were it not for the five-second penalty he incurred for starting over his grid box (he finished 0.774 seconds behind George Russell).
Norris’ struggles while his teammate cruised to victory unleashed a media firestorm over whether he was crumbling under pressure. But criticism of Norris has largely lacked the nuance the conversation surrounding his struggles deserves.
Let’s start with the on-track performance. Yes, the race wasn’t Norris’ finest. Overshooting the grid box is an unforced error that cost him 2nd place, and Norris can only blame himself for that (which he has). But any criticism of Norris being unable to clear Russell and both Ferraris with ease in a car his teammate cruised to victory in misses two key points.
The first point is that clean air is king in F1. F1 cars are incredibly aerodynamic machines designed specifically to operate in “laminar flow” where the airflow is smooth and undisturbed, hence the colloquialism “clean air.” When that airflow gets disrupted by, say, a car running in front of you, the ensuing turbulence results in unpredictable changes to air pressure that decrease the downforce of the car behind and the amount of air going its cooling systems, thereby decreasing that car’s performance and making it harder to overtake. So even though Piastri and Norris had the same car in Bahrain, the turbulent air Norris was running in meant he couldn’t exploit the car’s performance the same way Piastri could in clean air. If only Norris were struggling to overtake, you could argue this is a solely McLaren/Norris issue. But as Suzuka illustrated, dirty air has become a massive problem that makes it incredibly difficult for anyone to overtake (for another example of this from Bahrain, look at Max Verstappen’s struggles to overtake Pierre Gasly despite driving a car that’s much better on paper).
The second point is that defensive driving exists. Even on a track like Bahrain where overtaking is possible, the driver ahead can still position their car in ways that make overtaking difficult. So criticizing Norris for being unable to pass the cars ahead of him at will ignores the fact the drivers ahead had an obvious interest in him not passing them and did their best to prevent that.
At this point, you could argue that, like at Suzuka, Norris sealed his fate during Saturday’s qualifying. But unlike in Suzuka, Norris was seemingly hampered in qualifying in Bahrain, with McLaren Team Principal Andrea Stella admitting the team made last-minute changes to the car before the crucial final qualifying session that made it harder for Norris to drive the car. Why the team would do so is beyond me, but it shows that two things can be true at once: Norris can have a messy race weekend and be the victim of things outside his control.
As for criticism Norris has received for being frank about his feelings regarding his performance, I think his willingness to be open and honest should be celebrated rather than ridiculed. The stereotype that a champion can only look or behave a certain way (read: stoic) is both outdated and inaccurate (Verstappen is both the four-time defending champion and no stranger to radio outbursts). Sure, perhaps some of the comments Norris made to the press during Bahrain came off as overly self-deprecating, and you could say he shouldn’t self-criticize to such an extreme degree. But calling his honesty a “weakness” is only reinforcing negative stigma surrounding mental health when we should be lauding the positive example Norris is setting by being open about how he feels.
I’ll end this bit with a clip from an interview Sebastian Vettel gave earlier this week where he defended Norris and urged the media to do better when covering this type of story. It’s an eloquent encapsulation of why Norris should be celebrated for speaking out, and I hope that if you aren’t willing to believe a nobody like me you’ll hopefully believe a four-time world champion:
Russell and Mercedes experience technical difficulties, but finish strong.
George Russell: 2nd (Qualified 3rd)
Kimi Antonelli: 11th (Qualified 5th)
Russell and Antonelli both received one-place grid penalties after entering the fast lane of the pit lane before a confirmed restart time during qualifying. Antonelli’s slow start ultimately saw him finish outside the points for the first time this season, with a gamble on a three-stop strategy and fresher tires failing to pan out when the Safety Car was brought out on Lap 32 and allowed the cars ahead to pit. Meanwhile, Russell’s 2nd place finish was particularly impressive give the technical issues his car experienced throughout the race. A transponder failure meant he had to manually override his DRS (since the lack of radio signals meant the car could no longer automatically tell when the DRS should be operated), while a failure in the brake-by-wire system meant he had to manually reset it throughout the last 10 laps of the race.
I said after China that Mercedes are the team best positioned to chase down McLaren, and Russell’s podium finish despite the issues with his car only underscores this. Mercedes have scored three podiums across four races, and Antonelli’s 11th place finish in Bahrain was also only the first time a Mercedes didn’t score points this season. Catching McLaren will be difficult if Mercedes don’t start winning races, but their consistency means that they have an edge over other challengers (Ferrari, Red Bull) when it comes to the Constructors’ Championship.
Ferrari’s best weekend so far in 2025 is nowhere near enough.
Charles Leclerc: 4th (Qualified 2nd)
Lewis Hamilton: 5th (Qualified 9th)
Bahrain was far and away the best race weekend Ferrari have put together so far, with two finishes in the top 5 and Leclerc starting from the front row after Russell’s penalty in qualifying. But Leclerc’s inability to hold off Russell and Norris for a podium finish showed Ferrari are still lacking in race pace.
Reflected across the whole season, that difference in pace manifests in an uglier way. Leclerc moves up to 5th place in the Drivers’ Championship after Bahrain with 32 points, but Russell in 4th place has practically double the points (63). And while the congestion at the top between Norris, Piastri, Verstappen, and Russell means it would be wrong to count out Leclerc and Hamilton in the Drivers’ Championship, things are looking less rosy in the team standings. Ferrari’s 57 points means that they could reasonably catch Red Bull (71) with solid results like the one they achieved in Bahrain. But catching Mercedes (93) will be a bit harder task given the consistency Russell and Antonelli have shown so far. And catching McLaren (151) looks even more difficult with every passing week.
Red Bull’s positives from Bahrain fail to overshadow the negatives.
Max Verstappen: 6th (Qualified 7th)
Yuki Tsunoda: 9th (Qualified 10th)
The positive for Red Bull: a Red Bull driver not named Max Verstappen scored points for the first time since the 2024 Las Vegas Grand Prix. Two points isn’t a lot, but at least the driver swap is starting to bear some fruit for the team.
The negative for Red Bull: the problems with their car are so bad that not even Verstappen can mask them anymore. Case in point: Verstappen found himself not only unable to catch McLaren, Mercedes, and Ferrari, but locked in a race-long battle with Pierre Gasly’s Alpine. The defending champion’s visible struggles immediately caused widespread panic within the team, with reports suggesting that the downturn in form could trigger a performance-related escape clause in Verstappen’s contract. Verstappen dismissed questions about his future earlier this week, but it’s hard to take that at anything beyond face-value PR. There’s still a long way to go this season, and we’ll only know where Verstappen truly stands with the the team when the pressure intensifies in the summer.
Alpine score points! But can they keep it up?
Pierre Gasly: 7th (Qualified 4th)
Jack Doohan: 14th (Qualified 11th)
Much like their season breakthrough in 2024, Alpine’s breakthrough in 2025 seemingly materialized out of thin air (they did perform well at Bahrain during pre-season testing, but the number one rule about pre-season testing is to not look too closely at the results of pre-season testing). The question for the team after Gasly’s incredible qualifying performance and great race—which saw him be one lap away from holding off Verstappen for 6th place—is how much of this performance can be sustained across the rest of the season.
The answer isn’t particularly clear. Carlos Sainz was impressed by the cornering performance Alpine demonstrated in Bahrain, but the much-maligned Renault power unit the team uses will continue to prevent them taking full advantage of this strength. There’s also the question of Alpine’s performance vs. the rest of the grid. They’re still well behind the top 4 of McLaren, Mercedes, Red Bull, and Ferrari. And while Bahrain would suggest they’re ahead of midfield rivals like Haas and Williams, the latter two have demonstrated their cars are currently better set up to perform at a wider range of circuits. So Alpine have a fairly capped ceiling and a relatively low floor—not ideal if the team wants to consistently score points.
Make no mistake, Alpine this year are miles ahead of where they were at the same stage last year (though admittedly that bar was so low it was probably underground). You shouldn’t be shocked to see one or both cars consistently hover around the points the rest of the season. But hovering around the points doesn’t score you points, and at the end of the day it’s the second part that matters.
Haas’ strategic gamble pays off.
Esteban Ocon: 8th (Qualified 14th)
Ollie Bearman: 10th (Qualified 20th)
Strategy matters in F1, and Haas proved in Bahrain how great strategy can completely transform a team’s fortunes.
With nothing left to lose after a disappointing qualifying, Haas opted for an aggressive undercut with Ocon by calling him into the pits on Lap 8. At a track like Bahrain where tire degradation is a big issue, putting on fresh rubber while the car was still relatively fueled was the right call. And while the undercut left Ocon a difficult final stint on the hard tires, he fought admirably to hold off Tsunoda for 8th place. Meanwhile, the Safety Car deployment on Lap 32 played into Haas’ decision to run Bearman longer on the soft tires at the start, since they were able to switch him back onto soft tires for the closing stages of the race. The soft tires helped him not only leapfrog from 12th into the points at the restart, but also hold off a charging Antonelli at the end.
The double-points finish in Bahrain was Haas’ second of the season, impressive given the team only managed such a result three times over the course of 2024. And the news gets better for them: with both Williams cars failing to score points in Bahrain, Haas have temporarily moved ahead of their biggest midfield rival and into 5th place in the Constructors’ Championship.
Williams get screwed over.
Alex Albon: 12th (Qualified 15th)
Carlos Sainz: DNF (Qualified 8th)
If there’s a team that deserves to cry foul after Bahrain, it’s Williams.
Tsunoda temporarily lost control on Lap 32 and crashed into Sainz. But what made the incident a bitter pill to swallow for Sainz was that the accident left him with a ruptured sidepod, whereas Tsunoda got off scot free and was able to finish the race. Things then briefly got more awkward for Sainz post-race: he was initially handed a three-place grid penalty for this week’s race in Saudi Arabia for failing to serve a 10-second penalty he incurred mid-race for causing a collision with Antonelli, only for the FIA to sheepishly rescind the penalty minutes later after they’d realized Sainz had already served the initial penalty before he retired.
The real damage Williams experienced, though, occurred during qualifying Saturday. Albon was initially knocked out in the first round of qualifying, only to find out after the second round of qualifying that Nico Hülkenberg’s lap during Q1 should have been deleted for exceeding track limits. While Albon was promoted to 15th, the late discovery of the error meant he was unable to participate in Q2. This definitely impacted Albon’s race on Sunday when you consider the fact Sainz was able to start 8th on the grid. Even if Albon couldn’t join Sainz in Q3, the likelihood is he would’ve still been able to start the race higher than 15th and been in a more competitive situation, not to mention score points. That Williams got overtaken by Haas in the Constructors’ Championship after Bahrain will only make this series of unfortunate events sting more. Sure, a one-point difference after four races isn’t a big deal, and given the form Williams have shown so far there’s no reason to think they couldn’t make it up. But on a grid as competitive as this one, every point counts. And Williams lost out on the opportunity to score points in Bahrain through no fault of their own.
Lawson’s mistakes dominate Racing Bulls’ weekend.
Isack Hadjar: 13th (Qualified 12th)
Liam Lawson: 16th (Qualified 17th)
I’m still convinced that Lawson should be given some leeway after all the drama he’s been through to start the season, but a messy race in Bahrain—he was given a 5-second penalty for causing a collision with Lance Stroll and a 10-second penalty for causing a collision with Hülkenberg—will not do him any favors. Neither will being outperformed by his rookie teammate. Racing Bulls are likely looking to Lawson to be the team’s number one driver, and a failure to perform would doom his career in F1. A fall from a top team like Red Bull means you can still find refuge lower on the grid, but a fall from lower on the grid means you’ll have to look for refuge somewhere off the grid.
The wheel’s on Aston Martin’s 2025 have come off.
Fernando Alonso: 15th (Qualified 13th)
Lance Stroll: 17th (Qualified 19th)
Like I said in my Suzuka recap, Aston Martin’s 2025 season is doomed if the team decides to focus on 2026. Reports this week suggesting Technical Director Adrian Newey is completely focused on the 2026 car means Aston have given up on 2025 in all but name. And while it’s a decision that will hopefully work out long-term, the remaining 20 races promise to be dreary for Alonso and Stroll. When asked about the strengths of Aston’s 2025 car, Stroll said there weren’t any.
The wheels, then, have come off on Aston Martin’s 2025 season. And I mean that both metaphorically and literally—Alonso’s steering wheel literally came off during practice in Bahrain:
No, Sauber didn’t score points this race.
Gabriel Bortoleto: 18th (Qualified 18th)
Nico Hülkenberg: DSQ (Qualified 16th)
But at least they’ll always have the 6 points from Australia!