It was hot, dry and dusty. In the first 30 minutes of the first practice session, it was reported that no teams are willing to go out, as everybody only have 14 set of tyres each in a race weekend and they would not want to ruin their tyres by running on the dusty track of Sakhir. The first car will effectively became the sweeper to clean the track.
And that role falls on Giancarlo Fisichella, the first VJM02 to run. Then the whole field follow suit.
PRACTICE 2
Lewis Hamilton topped the first practice, giving a much needed motivation to the McLaren team. Not only they are having issue with the car's pace, they are also in the midst of the lie-gate scandal which the result will be revealed on Wednesday. The fact that Hamilton topping the timesheet also meant McLaren are going in the right direction with their upgrades, as shown by the improvements they made in China a week ago.
For Practice 2 Nico Rosberg again topped the timesheet. This is officially the seventh time he did that this season. In an interview Nico said that the Williamses performed marvellously in a single lap but not over a race distance. The time 1:33:339 is just slightly a tenth the time Kubica clocked when he secure pole position last year in Sakhir. But the trend built up in the season so far dictate the time to be much lower in qualifying.
PRACTICE 3
Practice 3 indicates that the track have improved much better, as the times clocked are under the 1:33. Raikkonen, Hamilton and Massa seems to have found the pace that they need to challenge for a better spot in Q3.
The fact that Practice 2 left rubber laid onto the racing line improved it, shows what will happened in qualifying and in the race itself. Besides the dust, Sakhir is known to be slippery and in the path of crosswinds. It will not be as slippery on race day as the track has been cleared of dust and rubber laid in. But crosswind will challenge drivers' skills, especially on corners. Luckily Sakhir don't have high speed corners. It only depends on whether the wind is strong or not. This happens the same on the famous Silverstone.
QUALIFYING
In qualifying, I noticed that McLaren have somewhat a new structure for their air intakes. Either they have a new car or it is just an accessory to the air intake, neither can be confirmed as of now. In Australia, Malaysia and China, they spot air intakes which is similar to last year's MP4-23, but in Bahrain it looks more like the one on the BGP001.
No other source of reference mentioned about this either.
Trulli and Glock score a first Toyota 1-2 and earned it at the very last minutes of Q3. Sebastian Vettel, who secured third, was adamant that the Toyotas are running light. And he is right, as shown by the post-qualifying weighing :
1. Jarno Trulli, Toyota, 648.5 kg
2. Timo Glock, Toyota, 643
3. Sebastian Vettel, Red Bull, 659
4. Jenson Button, Brawn GP, 652.5
5. Lewis Hamilton, McLaren, 652.5
6. Rubens Barrichello, Brawn GP, 649
7. Fernando Alonso, Renault, 650.5
8. Felipe Massa, Ferrari, 664.5
9. Nico Rosberg, Williams, 670.5
10. Kimi Raikkonen, Ferrari, 671.5
11. Heikki Kovalainen, McLaren, 678.5
12. Kazuki Nakajima, Williams, 680.9
13. Robert Kubica, BMW Sauber, 698.6
14. Nick Heidfeld, BMW Sauber, 696.3
15. Nelson Piquet, Renault, 677.6
16. Sebastien Buemi, Toro Rosso, 678.5
17. Giancarlo Fisichella, Force India, 652
18. Mark Webber, Red Bull, 656
19. Adrian Sutil, Force India, 679
20. Sebastien Bourdais, Toro Rosso, 667.5
From this list, we can expect Timo Glock to pit first and Trulli a lap later. Assuming the average amount of fuel per lap, that is about 3.3 litres, Vettel have more than three laps to create enough gap for him to take the lead before pitting.
All other top ten drivers are on a conservative fuel load, except for the Ferraris and Nico Rosberg who seems tu run significantly heavier. The Scuderias might opt to run a different strategy since they know they are not there with the top runners.
Interesting to note is that the option tyres are performing better than the prime here in Sakhir. According to the teams, they recorded almost a second per lap slower for the prime tyres.
We can safely say that the Ferraris will be starting on the super-soft Bridgestone thus expecting to run longer on it. This will lessen their time running on the prime, at least theoretically. The strategy will be much the same for other top tens, except the Toyotas. They might be forced to use the prime on the last stint. This is simply because the other teams are running longer on the super-soft, and thus are most likely to have the luxury to use the prime on the last stint.
Alonso again demonstrate his mastery in driving his R29. While Piquet forced to satisfied qualifying in Q2 for the first time, Alonso managed to monster his machine further up the grid, securing seventh place.
It is another bad qualifying for the BMWs, as they struggle to find grip with their F1.09. The BMW opt to run with KERS on both cars, as well as Ferrari. NIck Heidfeld was never at the pace with the car, KERS or no KERS. Kubica, meanwhile might struggle to cope woth the extra 30kg at the back. The 80bhp might not propel him as fast as the other light drivers.
Force India fare better, emptying the last spot for the Toro Rosso of Bourdais. With a few more upgrades, the VJM02 might become a regular midfield contender. In the process, they might secure their elusive first points.
The track and ambient temperature registered to be hotter than last year and it could be as well the hottest race this season.
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