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Bahrain FP1 Report | Alonso finishes second fastest, splitting Red Bull
Red Bull Racing have started the first free practice session at the top of the leaderboard. Following on from a really positive test, Sergio Perez finished Bahrain's FP1 fastest with Max Verstappen not far behind in third. Confirming Aston Martin's pace from pre-season, Alonso split the two Red Bull drivers to raise hopes of a fresh challenge at the top of the standings.
Test and development
The first 30 minutes of the session seemed like an extra test from last week. Very meaningless times were set on the leaderboard with various teams testing new parts. Hardly a surprise given qualifying and the race will be completed at different times of the day. This included Ferrari who had a wobbly rear wing that needed changing as soon as possible.
Alpine drove out of the pitlane with large aero rakes attached to the rear of Esteban Ocon's car. This would suggest they've either introduced some extra updates since testing, or they are behind others in searching for data. Other teams had minor splashes of flow-vis paint or significantly smaller aero rakes. McLaren had their flow-vis paint around the front wheel where they had issues in testing last week.
Lance Stroll returned to the cockpit for the first time this season. The Aston Martin driver missed pre-season testing following a wrist injury sustained during a bike crash. Though it wasn't smooth running for the Canadian as he only recorded two laps in the first 30 minutes. There was an ignition issue on his car. He returned to the track and started to catch his teammate Fernando Alonso on the leaderboard.
Carlos Sainz had the biggest moment on the circuit. Around turn 8/9, his Ferrari was porpoising and it bottomed out in a bump. This threw the car into a 360 spin. Sainz was lucky that only the tyres were ruined.
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The leaderboard
The leaderboard was like a fruit machine during the first 30 minutes with various different run plans taking place. But once the soft tyres came on, Red Bull went to the top. Alonso managed to split the two drivers with a quick time in the final ten minutes. In the second sector, he managed to equal Verstappen's best.
Charles Leclerc set his fastest time on the medium tyres and sat 1.5 seconds behind Perez's best time. On the same tyre, the two Mercedes drivers were another 0.5 seconds behind but fuel loads and engine modes remain unknown. Carlos Sainz finished with the slowest time, and had a big spin during the hour. Lando Norris rounded out the top four.
