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F1 Drivers Criticize Delayed Bahrain Grand Prix Start
Confirmed
In Short: The start of the Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia was delayed by over 90 minutes due to heavy rain, with drivers struggling to maintain power under wet conditions.
The start of the Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia was delayed by over 90 minutes due to heavy rain, with drivers struggling to maintain power under wet conditions.
"It was horrible," reigning champion Lando Norris told ESPN, reflecting the sentiment of many drivers.
"We missed some good racing, wet tires at the beginning, we should have been out there running," Aston Martin driver Lance Stroll said.
Williams driver Carlos Sainz called for the sport to reassess its approach, stating, "We need to have a hard look at ourselves and see how we ended up in this situation."
George Russell, who retired due to a power unit issue, felt the fans deserved a better show, saying, "The whole day felt like a bit of a faff, with the delay and then the red flag and then endless laps under the safety car."
Lewis Hamilton likened the situation to a marketing stunt with electric go-karts, saying, "It was like the Lego race!"
Red Bull's Max Verstappen agreed, noting, "Yeah, we had the same speed."
Drivers emphasized the need for the sport to learn from these issues, with Verstappen stating, "It was insane. Like at some point we were five-wide in the straight, because we couldn't understand what was going on."
What's confirmed
- The start of the Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia was delayed by over 90 minutes due to heavy rain, with drivers struggling to maintain power under wet conditions.
- "It was horrible," reigning champion Lando Norris told ESPN, reflecting the sentiment of many drivers.
- "We missed some good racing, wet tires at the beginning, we should have been out there running," Aston Martin driver Lance Stroll said.
What's still developing
- A deluge of rain as the cars arrived on the grid resulted in the start of the race being delayed by 40 minutes before the first attempt was made to get racing underway behind a safety car.
- The FIA later said that "an unprecedented combination of low engine speed, low-grip conditions, wet-weather energy management settings and the Sepang circuit's sector configuration led to an unintended loss of power for a number of cars."
- "Instead cars are fixing their software issues. It's a bit sad to see."
- But before the cars could complete a single lap behind the safety car, a bug in the software supplied to all teams by the FIA resulted in multiple drivers losing power and dropping down the order.
- "It proves that we shouldn't have any of that stuff on the electronic side." When the issue became apparent, all cars were told to return to the pits, where a software patch was supplied by the FIA and uploaded by each team.
- "I mean, it's obviously not great what happened today -- I'm sure we will learn from it as a sport, but what happened today is totally unacceptable for the sport."
- "Not a lot more to say -- just learn as a sport not to do those mistakes again and not suffer from the same strange cases."
- "I'd have been a bit disappointed if I was in the stands, watching that unfold, so... that wasn't good."