Bahrain
WHAT THE TEAMS SAID
RACE REACTIONS FROM THE FORMULA 1 GULF AIR BAHRAIN GRAND PRIX 2025
Haas
Esteban
OCON
“I’m super happy for the team because I let them down yesterday making that mistake when there was more potential in the car. Today, everything worked out as planned; we got a mega start and managed to get an aggressive strategy to straight away be fighting in the points. From there, it was the maximum we could’ve done as the Safety Car put us in a bad position, as we were about to get overtaken by Tsunoda, and Ollie benefited as well. It was a great drive from him coming from P20 – a double-points finish for the team. We’re delighted as it’s the maximum we could’ve done and I’m proud of what we’ve achieved.”
Oliver
BEARMAN
“I feel good, it was a great race. It flew by and those last 20 laps after the Safety Car I was under pressure trying to hold position with the Mercedes behind, and trying to fight ahead as well – so it was a tough one. I’m so happy to bring a point home for the team after a really tough Qualifying yesterday. Of course, it was a bit lucky to get the Safety Car, but I felt really strong in the first stint, the second stint on the hard was a bit tricky, but we caught the Safety Car which was lucky. Then to hold my position is easier said than done with faster cars around you. I’m proud of how I performed today, and the team did a fantastic job as well.”
Williams
Alex
ALBON
"We were unfortunate today. Points were on the cards, our race pace was really strong, and we had really good first and second stints. Then we got a bit unlucky with the Safety Car and had to double stack, so we lost a couple of places. I’m generally still happy though; a lot of lessons have been learned that we can carry forward to the rest of the year."
Carlos
SAINZ
"A frustrating end to a promising race. After a nice start, I used up my soft tyres battling hard and trying to keep within DRS of the faster cars around me. Once the soft compound was done, we stopped and went back at it gaining positions with good overtakes. Unfortunately, the incident with Yuki cost us the race. The impact on my right hand sidepod caused major damage and that was it for me. Despite the end result, there are a lot of positives to take. We had good pace all weekend and could have been in the points today, so we’ll take it as it is and look at how we can come back stronger next week in Saudi."
Racing Bulls
Isack
HADJAR
"The start of the race wasn’t good as I lost four places, and I felt like I wasn’t moving from the grid spot. I didn’t really understand why, so we’ll need to review what happened. I think procedure-wise was okay, but I was wheel spinning, and this put us in the wrong momentum throughout the first lap. A better Qualifying might have changed our race, but overall, our pace and strategy were aggressive today, and I think this was the right way to do it. Unfortunately, though, after the start, we were just too far away, and this didn’t help us; the same with the Safety Car, which didn’t allow us to have an easy restart on used hard tyres. We’ll focus on the bits we missed here in Bahrain to look at adjusting them for the future.”
Liam
LAWSON
“The race was action packed. We had good speed but just couldn't really use it and the only way I could overtake was lunging quite late. I wasn't intentionally touching others, but obviously the stewards made their decision with the penalties, so we'll have to review the incidents. It's a shame we don't have the results to show us pushing forwards as a team, as the car was really fast in Qualifying and we didn't get to show it. The car was also fast in the race, but there's obviously only so much you can do starting from the back. It was just a race that just didn't quite come together."
Aston Martin
Fernando
ALONSO
"We didn't have the pace all weekend and especially tonight. I was extending my stint on the medium tyres, but then the Safety Car balanced everything again and we didn't really benefit from it. We expected it to be a difficult track for us and we need to try improve the car for future races. It's a different challenge in Jeddah, so let's see if we can be any better next week."
Lance
STROLL
"There's not much to say about today; it's been a really tough weekend for us. We are not where we want to be at the moment and we are pushing hard to change that. Let's see what learnings we can take from this race and how we do next week. The track characteristics in Jeddah are quite different so let's see how we do there, although we are not expecting any big jumps."
Kick Sauber
Gabriel
BORTOLETO
"It's been a tough afternoon, but we did see some improvements in pace at times. Overtaking was definitely a challenge – as soon as I got close to the car ahead, I just couldn’t find the grip to make a move, especially through the corners. It's obviously frustrating, especially after the Safety Car restart when I was on mediums against the hard tyres of the car in front but still couldn’t find a way through. Overall, it’s crucial to take time to analyse everything and understand how we can improve our performance. In the short term, the goal is to move on from a challenging weekend, take the learnings with us, and focus on Jeddah to finish off this triple header."
Nico
HULKENBERG
"It has been a difficult weekend, overall, and tonight was not different. The start wasn't the best – I was on the inside for turn one but then got pushed wide in turn two and lost all my drive heading down to turn four. I ended up last by the time we arrived there, which obviously made things not easier, especially as we were starting on the soft tyre. We pitted early and aggressively, which meant running two very long stints: getting something out of this race was always going to be a long shot after that. This track really exposed some of our car’s weaknesses, so there are important lessons to learn. Over one lap, I think we’re pretty decent if we get everything together, but our long-run pace needs improvement.”
