As the 2024 pre-season testing came to a conclusion at the Bahrain International Circuit on Friday, The SportsRush’s Tanish Chachra sat down with ex-McLaren F1 mechanic, Marc Priestley. Priestley spoke about the upcoming season and Red Bull’s potential dominance. Even though they were much faster than every other team on the grid during the testing, the 47-year-old believes that things could turn out differently when the cars take to the track in Bahrain next week.
In a conversation with Tanish Chachra of The SportsRush, Priestley gave his views on how Max Verstappen dominated the first day of testing. He said,
“It was a collective sort of sigh around the world when the timesheets came in at the end of that day.”
That being said, one week can make all the difference in F1 according to Priestley.
For anyone curious, Max Verstappen is already nearly as fast as he was on DAY 2 of last year’s preseason test.
His best time so far on Day 1: 1:31.662
His best time on Day 2 in 2023: 1:31.650 pic.twitter.com/Fa3WRaSuAb— Daniel Valente ️ (@F1GuyDan) February 21, 2024
“The cars that you see racing in Bahrain will not be the same as the ones we see running around the test track at the moment,” explained the Bromley native. However, he still feels that despite Red Bull’s rivals bringing in significant upgrades to their cars for next week’s race, the RB20 “in the hands of Max Verstappen” is going to be a tough to beat.
Verstappen picked up right where he left off on the very first day of testing. For a brief moment, fans had hope of a potential challenger when Lando Norris’ McLaren topped the timing charts. But then, Verstappen came out again. This time he retook the fastest lap of the session by almost a second which showed just how good the Red Bull car is.
Red Bull may have overplayed their hand during testing
In 2023, Max Verstappen and Red Bull had a historic season together. Out of 22 races, the Milton-Keynes-based outfit won 21, and Verstappen had 19 to his name.
Naturally, as the Dutchman obliterated the field on the very first day of this year’s testing, fans feared the worst. According to veteran F1 journalist Mark Hughes, however, Verstappen’s lap times should be taken with a pinch of salt. The 26-year-old seemingly had more attempts at being faster compared to his rivals.
Hughes feels that the lap times come with a caveat of “Verstappen having five serious attempts at a fast time compared to one each for Alonso and Leclerc and two for McLaren’s Lando Norris who ended up as second fastest overall,” as quoted by The Race.
Pre-season testing complete! ✅ A strong final day from our boys as @Charles_Leclerc tops the timesheets#F1Testing pic.twitter.com/XopFElxBJS
— Scuderia Ferrari (@ScuderiaFerrari) February 23, 2024
Hughes’ analysis might align with Marc Priestley’s. Day 2 and Day 3 of testing saw Ferrari take up the top step of the leaderboard with Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc registering the fastest laps, respectively. Even though testing times are not really representative, 2024 might see a team finally topple Red Bull from their high perch.
