F1 2018 results: Bahrain Grand Prix updates, highlights and reaction

Sebastian Vettel went from pole position to victory in the Formula One Bahrain Grand Prix on Sunday, winning the second race of the season in at least as much dramatic fashion as he won the first in Australia. While Vettel benefited from a pit mistake by Mercedes in the first race, the second was all him and extremely careful tire management.

Valtteri Bottas pushed hard, hard enough to get DRS assistance in the final two laps behind Vettel, but he couldn’t quite make it stick. He was on a different strategy to Vettel, and on much fresher tires. But Vettel just managed to contain the gap.

“Woooooo!,” Vettel came over the team radio after the race. “These tires were done. They were done!”

Another lap and you get the feeling Bottas would have overtaken him. Lewis Hamilton, who started far back due to a five-place grid penalty, worked his way up to third place and was six seconds back of Vettel at the end of the race, so it was a good showing from him, but he hoped to be competing for the lead.

Pierre Gasly of the Honda-powered Toro Rosso managed to finish fourth, the best finish for that team in a long time. Meanwhile, the Renault-powered McLaren, a year after moving on from Honda, saw its drivers finish seventh (Fernando Alonso) and eighth (Stoffel Vandoorne).

Below, you can see the full finishing order, and below that, you can read our live blog as it happened.

Lap 57/57 FINAL

Bottas misses the DRS detection zone by less than a tenth of a second! Bottas now has DRS going down the pit straight. Bottas is right on Vettel’s rear. Down the main straight he’s gaining on Vettel going into the final lap. Bottas tries an overtake, but he can’t quite stick it. Bottas is too far back in the next detection zone, and Vettel is safe. Vettel takes the win by .6 seconds! Bottas takes second, and Hamilton, who managed to get within six seconds, takes third. Gasly finishes fourth, and Magnussen in fifth.

Lap 55/57

Hamilton is 11 seconds back and should be in third to finish. Gasly comfortably increases his lead over Magnussen for fourth, getting seven seconds clear with five laps to go. Bottas gets 1.7 seconds behind .. another lap and he’ll have DRS assistance! Bottas locks up on Turn 10 — he can’t do that to survive. Three laps left and the gap is 1.2 seconds.

Lap 53/57

Bottas takes a second out of Vettel, 4.5 seconds back on Lap 51. Open space for both drivers. Bottas 3.6 seconds back ... Vettel is struggling with grip on his tires. Bottas is in Vettel’s mirrors. This one is coming down to the wire. 2.9 seconds back!

Lap 48/57

Vettel is told that he is on “Plan B,” which has to be a one-stopper at this point. Alonso and Hulkenberg pit, and Gasly has a lot of open space in front of him from fourth place, though Magnussen isn’t far behind him.

Hamilton is having issues with his radio — his team can’t really hear him. He then loses nearly three seconds while being held up behind Perez, who was being blue-flagged. That hurts big, big, big time. Hamilton was meeting his target times until that point.

Grosjean pits, comes out in 15th. He had to get debris removed from underneath the car.

Bottas is 5.6 seconds back of Vettel.

Lap 38/57

Disaster for Ferrari and one of their mechanics. Raikkonen came in for the pit stop, and they didn’t get one of the tires off properly, it looks like. Raikkonen also hit a mechanic on the release, and they are getting him medical attention. There hasn’t been a replay.

The left rear tire was never fit at all, the camera shows, and Raikkonen’s race is over. Ferrari will likely be penalized for their second unsafe release of the weekend.

Magnussen is still running seventh, Gasly in sixth and Alonso in fifth. Vettel is 6.4 seconds clear of Bottas.

Lap 32/57

Vettel is up about five seconds on Hamilton, but the pit delta is around 24 seconds. Magnussen pits for the second time, comes out and immediately passes Perez for 11th. Grosjean loses a piece of bodywork from the back of his car, and Magnussen is chasing him for ninth, while Grosjean is chasing Ocon for eighth.

“What the **** is he doing?!” Magnussen said over the team radio, of Grosjean. “Tell him to get out of the ****ing way!” After Grosjean pits, Magnussen has more words for his team, sarcastically telling them “Well done.” Magnussen quickly uses DRS to move past Ocon.

Lap 27/57

Bottas is gaining on Vettel, while Raikkonen sets a fastest lap with a time of 1:34.411.

Looks like Ricciardo’s failure was an electrical engine issue, while Verstappen sustained too much damage in the puncture. Rough outing for Red Bull, who hoped to be competing with Ferrari and Mercedes today.

And it’s a ... fastest lap of the race from Bottas on the medium tire. Vettel continues to cut into the gap behind Hamilton. Ericsson finally comes in from the soft tire, and rejoins in 15th behind Leclerc. Bottas team radio tells him that he’s on “Plan B.” Vettel is right on Hamilton’s rear!

Vettel uses DRS and shoots past Hamilton around Turn 1, and Hamilton looks like he’s going to stop soon. Hamilton held Vettel up a bit. It’s the medium tires for Hamilton. He rejoins in fourth, well ahead of Gasly and he should be fine to the end. The same probably can’t be said for the Ferrari!

Lap 21/57

Vettel comes in and pits from the lead, putting on a set of soft tires. Bottas stays out, despite Mercedes coming out as though they’re going to change his tired. Raikkonen also stays out. Team radio comes over telling Hamilton that “It’s all going to start happening now, Lewis.” They also said they’re sticking with “Plan A.”

Raikkonen comes in to pit on Lap 20, and Bottas comes in as a result, and Hamilton, on the medium tires, is in the lead. Bottas rejoins ahead of Raikkonen, also on the medium tires! Hamilton is only 6.5 seconds up on Vettel, who just set purples all over the lap!

Lap 19/57

Magnussen pits for Haas and everyone holds their breath (they had a double retirement in Australia following pit stop issues) and ... it looks fine. He gets back out there. Alonso pits from eighth position, and fits the medium tires, meaning he’ll likely try and go the rest of the race on the set. Alonso quickly moves up to 11th with some DRS assistance upon coming out.

Hulkenberg makes it past Sirotkin after a couple attempts. Bottas is gaining on Vettel, slowly but surely.

Lap 13/57

Hartley gets a 10-second time penalty for causing a collision with Perez on the opening lap. It’s what spun Perez, and has him in 15th place at the moment. He’ll serve it on his next pit stop. Perez comes in on Lap 10 for a pit stop, and fits the durable medium tires. Currently, Vettel is nearly 15 seconds clear of Hamilton, but the gap should come down to the tire choice. Alonso, Magnussen and Hulkenberg all lock up going into Turn 10. Stroll comes into the pits for Williams, and comes out in 18th. Ricciardo’s car seems to have just ... stopped, upon replay.

Lap 9/57

Purple lap from Vettel, and Hartley makes it past Sainz for 10th. Both Toro Rosso cars are in the points, though there’s a lot of race left. Hamilton passes Gasly, and we have a Ferrari-Mercedes-Ferrari-Mercedes.

Top 5 on Lap 9: Vettel, Bottas, Raikkonen, Hamilton, Gasly

Lap 6/57

Verstappen limps around and gets into the pit lane. He gets back onto the track in last place with the super soft tires fitted. Ricciardo’s car is removed from the track and the virtual safety car ends halfway through Lap 4. Magnussen catches Gasly napping, and they bump wheels around Turn 11. Hulkenberg makes it past Ocon, while Hamilton makes up multiple places to move into sixth position! Verstappen now stops on the side of the track and he’s out too!

Both Red Bulls are out! Hamilton moves up another spot, passing Magnussen for fifth. Vettel up on Bottas by about two seconds.

Lap 2/57

Bottas makes a big move on Raikkonen around the first corner! Gasly quickly makes it past Ricciardo, but loses the place. Perez spins at the hairpin, and ... Alonso make a move to pass Hamilton! We have a yellow flag from Perez’s spin, and it looks like Verstappen is slowing down! Verstappen looks like he sustained a puncture going wheel-to-wheel with Hamilton, and drops to the back of the back .. and Red Bull is having an awful day as Ricciardo also stops! Virtual safety car deployed.

Before the race

A mistake from the garage caused Lewis Hamilton and Mercedes to lose out on first place in the first race of the 2018 Formula One season, and a grid penalty will make it an even tougher proposition for him to get on the podium at the Bahrain Grand Prix on Saturday, let alone first place. Sebastian Vettel took the Australian Grand Prix, and managed to qualify in pole position for Bahrain as well.

The race will be broadcast by ESPN2 in the United States, with live streaming at Watch ESPN and via fuboTV. It will begin at 11 a.m. ET, a good start time for an international race. ESPN2 had some issues in the first race of the season, from incorrect information to commentators being cut off mid-sentence due to commercials, which are not present in the Sky Sports F1 broadcast that ESPN is using this season.

Additionally, F1 TV Pro, the over-the-top streaming service, is not ready for a global launch despite initial hopes that it would be ready for Australia. It’s now expected to launch close to the Chinese Grand Prix, the third race of the season.

Hamilton had to take a five-place grid penalty for a gearbox change, an unfortunate development as gearboxes are expected to last a team six consecutive races before being changed. The limitations on numbers of engine parts that can be changed are in place to keep costs down, so a financially-sound team like Mercedes can’t just run a new engine every race without penalties.

In the first race, Hamilton had qualified in pole position, but a timing issue during a pit stop let Vettel get ahead of him for Ferrari. Hamilton finished second in the race while Vettel’s teammate, Kimi Raikkonen, finished third.

Vettel has pole and Raikkonen is right behind him for Saturday’s race. Valtteri Bottas, Hamilton’s Mercedes teammate, had a much better qualifying run this time out (he crashed in Australia), and will start third on the grid, ahead of Daniel Ricciardo fo Red Bull. Ricciardo’s teammate, the young and aggressive Max Verstappen, crashed in the second qualifying session and will start 15th on the grid.

Both of the cars from Haas F1, the only American-owned team currently in the sport, had phenomenal races in the opener and were expected to bring home some serious points ... until consecutive pit mistakes led to both cars retiring. Haas driver Kevin Magnussen will start sixth for Bahrain, while teammate Romain Grosjean had a bad first qualifying session and will start 16th on the grid.

Below you can find all the viewing and streaming information for the race, and under that is the full starting grid and qualifying times.

Date: Sunday, April 8
Location: Bahrain International Circuit, Sakhir
TV: ESPN2
Time: 11 a.m. ET
Online Streaming: WatchESPN, ESPN App, fuboTV