Max Verstappen has won his first race of the season, after fighting back from a poor start during a chaotic Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia.
After a 40-minute delay, the grid gingerly made its way around the Sepang International Circuit to form up for the season’s first wet start, which proved problematic for many drivers, with Lewis Hamilton’s Ferrari suffering a software issue.
As a result of the confusion, track conditions, and many cars being out of position, the starting procedure was halted, and the red flag was thrown to reset the grid. Despite many drivers being overtaken on the formation lap, Race Control decided to reset the start order to the original grid, contrary to the regulations.
The delay to the start meant the track dried enough for some teams to gamble on starting on slick tyres, with several drivers starting the race on the dry tyres. Ferrari gambled both of its drivers, while Red Bull and Mercedes opted for the Intermediate tyre.
At lights out, Kimi Antonelli and George Russell had great starts, with Max Verstappen struggling off the line. Those starting on slick tyres were swallowed up, with both Ferraris dropping all the way back to beyond the second half of the grid. By the first two laps, all the drivers on Intermediates had overtaken those on slicks, with a clear separation of the field.
Lap 9 saw the deployment of the Safety Car after Valtteri Bottas found himself beached in the gravel at Turn 13. This prompted all the Intermediate runners to stop for slicks. At the restart on Lap 13, Verstappen took the lead back from Antonelli at Turn 3, with the Italian then being passed by Russell.
Hamilton’s gamble to stay out on his Soft tyre during the Safety Car started to pay dividends on the restart, carving his way through the pack and finding himself in seventh by Lap 21. On the same lap, Antonelli overtook Russell to begin his charge towards Verstappen, and Gabriel Bortoleto received a 10-second time penalty for causing a collision with Carlos Sainz.
At Lap 43, the Virtual Safety Car was deployed after Alexander Albon’s gearbox failed, which prompted Verstappen to dive into the pit lane for a fresh set of tyres, which was eventually followed by both Mercedes. Two laps later, the second Safety Car was deployed, which brought the field together again for a shootout over the final five laps of the race.
Tragedy for Russell struck on Lap 50, while the field was still under the Safety Car and anticipating a restart; his power unit failed, forcing him to pull up at the end of pit straight and forcing the extension of the Safety Car. This was a massive hit to his title chances, with Antonelli running second on track.
On the restart, Verstappen put his foot down before the final corner, maintaining his lead into Turn 1. At the start of the next lap, Hamilton completed his recovery, passing Isack Hadjar for the final podium place. Leclerc then managed to overtake Hadjar on the next lap, sparing Ferrari’s earlier wrong strategy gamble.
Verstappen’s win marks the longest gap between consecutive victories for a driver at the same circuit at nine years, beating Nigel Mansell’s record of seven at Kyalami in South Africa.
Speaking after the race, he said he was proud of everyone at Red Bull following the team and driver’s first win of the season. It was also the first win for the team powered by its in-house Red Bull Ford Powertrains Power Unit.
