Bahrain: pre-race 2019

For the second year in a row, Mercedes dominated Australian qualifying only for Ferrari to lock out the front row in Bahrain. I believe the Hamilton/Bottas pole odds were circa evens and 3.5 respectively ahead of practice, so Leclerc would’ve had tasty odds.

First session was mostly as expected, with the sadly slow Williams trundling around dead last. Giovinazzi and Stroll were also eliminated, but the weird one was Hulkenberg. He’d clocked a fifth in one practice session and looked quick all weekend. Hard to say if it was traffic, a car problem, or he was just a bit off the boil. But with the midfield so competitive, he’ll have a tough race starting 17^th.

In Q2, less than half a second covered those eliminated, and there was only a hundredth of a second between fastest departing driver and the slowest chap to make it through. Ricciardo and Albon were top of the five, with Perez and Kvyat the slowest. In another odd elimination, Gasly will start 13^th (unless he benefits from a Grosjean penalty for clearly impeding Norris in Q1). He’s not having a great start to his Red Bull days.

Throughout qualifying, Ferrari had seemed utterly dominant. Would they maintain their crushing advantage? No. But they would retain sufficient speed to get a 1-2 on the grid. Leclerc scored his first ever F1 pole, three-tenths ahead of his team mate (Vettel had traffic in one session and had to use an extra set of tyres, so he only did one run in Q3, as did Verstappen).

Hamilton was three-hundredths off Vettel, and seven-hundredths ahead of team mate Bearded Bottas, who lines up alongside the Briton. Today, those without facial hair beat those with it.

Verstappen is next, but he was half a second off the Mercedes and eight-tenths off Leclerc. After Australia, I think the Dutchman will be rather more competitive in the race than he was in qualifying. Magnussen was very impressive, just five-thousandths off Verstappen.

Half a tenth further back was Sainz, lining up just ahead of Grosjean (before any penalty is applied to the Frenchman). Raikkonen was 9^th fastest in Q3, ahead of Norris. Pretty good day for McLaren.

My gut feeling right now is that Ferrari will get both chaps on the podium and Verstappen might well join them. Could be quite the battle. How Magnussen and Sainz fare, given they were so close to Verstappen’s qualifying pace, is an interesting question.

Penalties : Grosjean got a three-place grid penalty, pushing Ricciardo up to 10^th (Raikkonen and Norris 8^th and 9^th respectively).

Early betting ideas:

Ferrari double podium

McLaren double score

Verstappen podium

Ferrari are 1.4 for a double podium. Whilst perhaps likely, that’s too short.

McLaren are 3 to double score. Given Norris rises to 8^th and Sainz was starting 6^th anyway, that’s quite tempting. Last race, Sainz suffered a reliability failure, and Norris went backwards from 8^th to 12^th, though they’ve looked more competitive in Bahrain so far.

Verstappen is 3.5 for a podium. He was half a second off the top four cars in qualifying, however, whereas in Oz he was right amongst the Ferraris (although he did close up on Hamilton too, and was actually further away, about eight-tenths, off the Mercedes then). Perhaps not today.

Of those, the McLaren bet currently appeals most. But all the markets are now (Sunday morning) up, so I’ll give them a look and see if anything jumps out. Here are a few I considered:

Vettel, first lap leader, 4

Hamilton beat Vettel 2.75

Sainz, group winner, 4.33 (or winner without big six, 5)

Leclerc seems pretty self-assured but there’s always a chance he’ll fluff the start. If he does, Vettel’s next in line. 4 is ok.

Hamilton Vs Vettel is just a match bet. There was three-hundredths between them in qualifying. On paper, 2.75 looks really rather good. The question is how much of a qualifying premium do Mercedes have due to fancy party modes, and how well will the Ferrari do on race pace on an utterly different circuit? Mood music suggests the Ferrari’s race pace might be really rather good. Hmm. Still, the odds are longer than I would’ve thought (would’ve guessed 2.2ish).

In group betting, Sainz is 4.33 to beat Magnussen, Gasly, and Raikkonen. He starts ahead of Gasly and Raikkonen and immediately behind the Dane. The gaps, Sainz relative to Magnussen, in qualifying sessions were -0.004s, +0.038s, +0.056s. In short, they’re practically identical.If the Renault engine still lacks the fancy pants modes of the others (at least to the same degree) in qualifying, that suggests race pace *might* be better. Worth considering. And telling that Gasly is 2.87. The Frenchman complained of a car problem in qualifying. Not sure if that was the case. Also, tyres might be tricky as Gasly, unlike the other three, gets to choose his, which may make things easier.

Note: There’s a possibly better market for pretty much the same thing. Sainz is 5 to win ‘without the big six’ [including Gasly]. A third the odds for top 2.

I decided against the double points finish on McLaren. Whilst interesting, double bets are always doubly vulnerable to one car being victim of reliability woe or another driver’s incompetence. Also opted against Hamilton to beat Vettel. 2.75 are tempting odds, but if I’m right about Mercedes having a relative advantage in qualifying, that’ll unwind on race pace.

So, that leaves Sainz, and whether it’s better to back a 4.33 to beat Magnussen, Gasly, and Raikkonen, or a 5 (each way or not) on him being winner without the top 6 (which means 6^th or 7^th if Gasly fails to progress, and 7^th or 8^th if the Frenchman does). Tricky to choose between them (also, interesting to note Sainz’s odds are a little longer for the latter market but Magnussen’s are a little shorter, so an alternative would be splitting one stake with a quarter on Sainz to be winner without the top 6 and three-quarters on Magnussen to top that group).

In the end, I decided to keep it simple and backed Sainz to win the group (others being Magnussen, Gasly, and Raikkonen) at 4.33.

The post-race ramble should be up this evening.

Morris Dancer