The 2024 season is well and truly underway, with the first two practice sessions over. Plenty of surprises were in store for the fans, but a strong McLaren outing wasn’t one of them. The Woking-based team seems to have picked up from where they left off in 2023, with Oscar Piastri finishing fifth in FP2. Speaking about the same, Motorsport-Total quotes the Australian as he claims Red Bull might still have a couple of tricks up their sleeves.
“Red Bull doesn’t look as fast as we thought. Let’s see how many sandbags fall tomorrow.”
Both sessions saw a tight field in Bahrain, with drivers being tenths or hundredths of a second off from each other. Piastri claimed the field was a lot closer than he expected, with even V-CARB putting in strong times.
Mercedes looks a lot quicker than last year, per the Australian. He added even Fernando Alonso carried a lot of pace. Nonetheless, Piastri is confident McLaren can still fight for the podium.
: Full Result of Free Practice 1 in Bahrain
Daniel Ricciardo
Lando Norris
Oscar Piastri#F1 #BahrainGP pic.twitter.com/DCG0Nic107— F1 Naija (@f1_naija) February 29, 2024
Hoping to stay “near the top,” Piastri is certain McLaren is in the points zone for the race. Judging anything from a practice session is tough, but given that McLaren made incredible improvements to their car in 2023, building off on the same shouldn’t be an issue.
However, Piastri revealed the McLaren car is still a bit unstable. The windy conditions in Sakhir make it difficult for Piastri to accurately predict his team’s performance but believes they are on the right track.
Despite getting trumped by Oscar Piastri, Max Verstappen not too worried
Contrary to everyone’s expectations, Max Verstappen performed relatively average in both practice sessions. He finished in sixth position on both occasions, as McLaren’s Piastri got better results each time. As he returned to the pit, the Dutchman complained of a lot of bouncing of the car, claiming it was practically jumping.
After the sessions, Verstappen admitted the RB20 felt “miles off” his expectations. The seemingly sandbagging Red Bull car ended up half a second off the top time registered by Lewis Hamilton. Nonetheless, he remains confident of doing a better job in the Qualifying and Race sessions.
Komentar mas2 belanda (max verstappen) setelah sesi FP1 dan FP2 F1 bahrain pic.twitter.com/gZ1J8amKZN
— Ben (@bluebenss) February 29, 2024
Speaking to the media after FP2, Verstappen claimed Red Bull some teams potentially amped up their engine tuning. Hence, he isn’t too worried about the gap to P1. However, he doesn’t believe his team will have a distinct advantage on Friday or Saturday.
Instead, Verstappen claims the sessions will be very close. Despite some balancing issues, the 26-year-old was happy with the longer runs during practice. Hence, he feels confident in being able to fight at the front on race day.
