It was already clear to Red Bull’s competitors before the weekend that defeating Max Verstappen in Bahrain at the Formula 1 season opener would be difficult. In practice and qualifying, the world champion’s command of the RB20 has been even more impressive, underscoring his current edge over the competitors.

Not many people believe they will be able to compete with Charles Leclerc around Sakhir on Saturday, even if there was a fairly close battle for the top grid slots (his fastest Q2 lap would have been good enough for the pole).

“Let’s wait until the race,” stated Carlos Sainz of Ferrari about the qualifying gap to Red Bull that seemed closer than it did the year before. They manage to have a degradation that no one else can have and a racing pace that no one else can have, I believe, at that point where they seemingly level things up.
“I believe if you look at the last eight races from last year, we were always there and within reach of them in the qualifying round, and this year we felt like we were back in the hunt in the qualifying round [pace].” during the competition? We’ll investigate.

In addition, Red Bull has an advantage over its competitors in terms of tire strategy going into the Grand Prix, which is unfortunate for those who believe their chances of winning are slim due to Verstappen’s performance advantage.

Red Bull chose to use a hard tire during the final free practice instead of an early soft tire run, almost completely beneath the radar.

This implies that while all of its primary competitors have only utilized one soft, Red Bull teammates Verstappen and Sergio Perez have access to a new soft for the race.
It may seem strange to feel that having more soft tires is advantageous on a circuit with severe degradation like Bahrain, but in this case, it makes sense because the medium isn’t a particularly good Tyre for the competition.

“The medium is very close in terms of delta lap time with the hard but with higher degradation,” Mario Isola of Pirelli said. It implies that there isn’t really any benefit to it.”

Therefore, the qualities of the medium force the leaders into the soft, particularly at the start and opening stint.
Sola continued, “I think most people will start on the soft, or at least the cars in front of them since they would lose too many track places otherwise.

The difference in lap times between the hard and soft is significant. There are 1.5 seconds between the hard and soft, since medium/hard is 0.3–0.4 seconds and the soft is 1.2 seconds. That’s a large amount.

“So, if you start with the hard, and you are in front, with some possibilities for overtaking, then you start to lose track positions.”
In comparison to the others, Red Bull has a fairly good cushion thanks to the strategy that suggests soft tires be used for the first stint. It also provides greater grip away from the line and extra tire life.

Red Bull’s lead over that initial stint, according to Sainz’s estimation, was perhaps two or three seconds.

Red Bull’s decision to stick with its successful soft-hard-soft tactic from the previous year is also hinted to. The more cautious path might be chosen by those who have two Hards available.
Red Bull’s long-term form, car design, and tire strategy decisions all work together to make the other drivers concede that one team is the clear favorite in the opening Formula One race of 2024.

“I think race pace is the important one,” stated George Russell, who will start the race in third place. “The gap in qualifying was probably slightly closer to Max than we all expected.” We anticipated a deficit of approximately half a second. After testing, we came to that conclusion.”
Isola was quick to respond when asked by Motorsport.com if he had seen anything on the data this weekend that would suggest someone may challenge Verstappen.

“Max is very strong, I cannot tell any lie,” He laughed. “That is evident from the lap times from yesterday as well as from the test. Although I hope the others are close, he still seems to have the upper hand.

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