this weekend, bahrain (March 3-5) formula 1 2023, with a total of 23 appointments.The world’s biggest show signals the start on the circuit Sakir, and he does so with many questions to resolve. First clear: Can someone stop Max Verstappen and Red Bull? But there are many others. It remains to be seen if Ferrari can get close to the reigning champions and fight it out for the title with Carlos Sainz and his team-mate Charles Leclerc. There are also big unknowns for Mercedes, which has a better base than 2022, and who knows if Alonso will be able to get into podium contention from the start at the beginning of his era at Aston Martin.

Red Bull, the rival to beat

Energy drinks, their car and the perfect trio that make up the team of Max Verstappen have won the last two world titles. Last year, at the premier of the current regulations, Max won his second crown and Red Bull clinched his World Constructors’ Championship with a perfect second half of the season. Max achieved his 15th of his 22 wins and the 25-year-old driver started as a heavy favorite after the results seen in his testing this year’s pre-season.
Red Bull seemingly finished last year with a top-notch car to start building their 2023 car, and used it in a car that frightened pre-season testing. But be careful. The sanctions imposed on the group for exceeding the allowed budget limit for 2021 will leave them with less time to develop the car this year. That means their theoretical rivals Ferrari and Mercedes will need to take advantage of that and improve their cars more this year to keep them on edge.
A great start is expected for Red Bull, but as we saw with Ferrari last year, it’s not how it starts that matters, but how it ends. They know that at Ferrari Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc want to fight for everything. Also at Mercedes, Lewis Hamilton and George Russell want to join the fight well before 2022.

Ferrari corrects mistakes and moves forward

Ferrari has a car that won last year, but they had to fix a lot of things. They have improved engine reliability. That must mean more horsepower. It also has improved air resistance and more points on the straight line. Deterioration is a point they will have to continue to hone at this start and should have a big impact in Bahrain but we will have to see how it goes on other types of circuits with different characteristics. Ferrari needs to understand their car to get the most out of it in order to get closer to the Milton Keynes people who have the clearest ideas today.

Ferrari will have to take advantage of Red Bull’s sanctions, spend less time developing the car in the wind tunnel and simulations, evolve throughout the year and get closer without room for error.

Mercedes, better base than 2022

Mercedes, on the other hand, had grip issues in Bahrain, but they are on a much better base than last year. For 2022 they started with a car that caused a lot of problems but nevertheless they ended up arriving at the final round of the course. No one doubts that the fight must be in. The question is whether they will do it long enough to fight for the title. We are lucky to see Verstappen and Hamilton fighting face to face again after a controversial result in 2018. It’s hanging

Alonso, the mission begins

Joining the top three teams could be Aston Martin. Or it may look like it will at the first round of the year starting this weekend in Bahrain.
Even though Aston Martin has refreshed the car compared to last year, the birth of the AMR23 is very good. Alonso was happy with how his car was behaving, and he demonstrated that by setting very good times on each of his attempts, despite the petrol load. But above all, the potential of the machine was seen in the race pace.

In the long run, his tires deteriorate less than Ferrari and Mercedes, and his strength puts him in the middle of a battle with two of the three great starters for many, leaving Green We will be watching how Car and its competitors evolve during the race. course.

This could be a good start for a team that had to establish its original goal of leading midfield (from finishing seventh in 2022). .
na
Across the track, Aston Martin announced its intention to change “two-thirds” of the car in an intensive evolution programme. The goal is to take a step forward. Initially, they were able to pick podiums due to their good race pace, but we need to see if they can continue to battle the best teams in this ambitious development programme.

Middle zone: Alpine, Alfa Romeo, Haas start from the front

Alpine start as the main favorites leading a very tight pack behind the four best teams of Red Bull, Ferrari, Mercedes and Aston Martin with excellent race pace shown in testing. It takes place in his A523 which is very evolved but a very good Alfa from the start he has to contend with Romeo. The question for Alfa Romeo, a Swiss (Sauber) based organization, is to see if they can have a good program of evolution. Diluted because it was not seen. There, too, we have yet to see what Haas, which seems to have started right behind Alfa Romeo, will do. AlphaTauri, McLaren and Williams. McLaren have been a big disappointment this year and they seem to have started quite late with a lot of problems. They’ve already gone through that last year and they’ve been able to improve the car very well, until fighting for the lead in the middle zone with the Alpine. Red lanterns seem insipid to AlphaTauri and Williams.