It was a triple delight Bahrain Grand Prix for the Visa Cash App Racing Bulls (VCARB) team held at the Sepang Circuit in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Both their drivers finished in the top ten gaining valuable points with Kiwi Liam Lawson seventh and Brit Arvid Lindblad tenth.
The third delight was with their rival in the Teams’ Standings, Alpine, not scoring any crucial points with drivers Franco Colapinto and Pierre Gasly finishing 13th and 16th. Hence VCARB have continued to cement their fifth place by extending the gap back to Alpine from 15 to 22-points.
“A great race today,” commented Lawson, “Super happy with it and P7 in a very hectic race. Proud of the team and made all of the right decisions that put us in great place so happy to come home in P7.”
“Pretty nuts day” said Lindblad. “My busiest in F1. An amazing result to score points from the back of the grid, just a massive thank you to the team.
“Obviously a great day for the Red Bull family with their first win with this engine as well,” referring to sister team Oracle Red Bull Racing with driver Max Verstappen winning the Grand Prix from Mercedes’ Kimi Antonelli and Ferraris’ Lewis Hamilton.
“Getting both of our cars in the points has just been fantastic,” said VCARB Team Principal Alan Permane.”We got the basics right and that is what counted.”
With a delayed start to the race due to heavy rain, a key to the outcome was the gamble to start on either dry or wet tyres with the rain having stopped.
VCARB had both drivers on intermediate wets while rival Alpine gambled with dry tyres for Gasly and Colapinto, who immediately slipped down the field on a track that still held on to a lot of moisture.
Both VCARB drivers took advantage of better grip levels at the start with Lawson jumping from 11th to fourth and Lindbald from 22nd up into the top ten on the opening lap. This set them both up for top ten placings as some normality took over once the track had dried, pitstops took place and faster cars came through the field.
As Permane commented, the Team got the basics right and that is what counted
Teams’ Standings
1/ Mercedes 556
2/ Ferrari 405
3/ McLaren 316
4/ Red Bull Racing 298
5/ Racing Bulls 90
6/ Alpine 68
7/ Haas F1 Team 27
8/ Audi 17
9/ Williams 12
10/ Aston Martin 7
11/ Cadillac 0
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