The Bahrain Grand Prix 2013 was the 4th round of the 2013 F1 season, and took place at the Bahrain International Circuit in Sakhir, Bahrain, on April 21st.
Sebastian Vettel won the race after starting in the 2nd position, followed by Kimi Räikkönen, and Romain Grosjean completing the podium with an expectacular comeback, all the way from the 11th position of the grid.
Nico Rosberg started from the pole position, but only managed to finish 9th.
Final results
Race evolution
Pit Stops
There were a total of 71 pit stops during the race.
The most popular pit stop windows were:
- Laps 1-2: 4 stops
- Laps 7-14: 19 stops
- Laps 16-18: 4 stops
- Laps 20-29: 17 stops
- Laps 33-39: 15 stops
- Laps 41-44: 7 stops
- Laps 46-48: 5 stops
The fastest pit stop was Mark Webber's, stopping the clock at 21.031 seconds during his pit stop on lap 37, while the slowest one was was Jean-Éric Vergne's, who stopped the clock at 41.485 seconds, 20.454 seconds slower than Webber, during his pit stop on lap 2.
These times include the time the driver spent going through the pit lane, as well as the actual time he stopped for the mechanics to work on his car.
Strategy
The race was not obvious in terms of pit stop strategy, with different teams and different drivers choosing to make anywhere from 1 to 5 stops.
The race winner, Sebastian Vettel, was on a 3 stops strategy.
1 stop
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6Jean-Éric Vergne
2 stops
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1Paul di Resta
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6Kimi Räikkönen
3 stops
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7Adrian Sutil
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-Mark Webber
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8Romain Grosjean
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3Daniel Ricciardo
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1Sebastian Vettel
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6Sergio Pérez
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4Lewis Hamilton
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6Pastor Maldonado
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1Charles Pic
-
2Nico Hülkenberg
-
1Valtteri Bottas
4 stops
-
4Esteban Gutiérrez
-
5Fernando Alonso
-
8Nico Rosberg
-
-Jenson Button
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-Jules Bianchi
-
11Felipe Massa
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1Max Chilton
5 stops
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1Giedo van der Garde
Excluding those drivers who could not finish the race, those on a 2 stops strategy gained 3.5 positions on average, the ones on a 3 stops strategy gained 1.73 positions on average, the ones on a 4 stops strategy lost an average of 2.71 positions, while those on a 5 stops strategy lost an average of 1 positions.
Despite of the average possitons gained or lost, and considering a deeper analysis of the performance of each strategy, we consider the 3 stops strategy as the optimal for this race.
It is important to note that this might not always be the case for other races held at the Bahrain International Circuit, as the conditions might change from year to year, in terms of wheel degradation, accidents, safety cars, etc.
Incidents
There race went on mostly with no incidents. Only 1 divers were involved in circumstances that were severe enough to prevented them from finishing the race.
These included, .
Puncture
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Jean-Éric VergneLap 16
Qualifying
Nico Rosberg managed to get the pole position by 0.254 seconds and a final lipe time of 1:32.330. Right next to him, completing the first line of the grid, was Sebastian Vettel.
Track evolution
As the qualifying session went on, with the track rubbering in, and the drivers testing the limits of the grip of their cars, the times per lap dropped, and 14 out of the 16 drivers that took place in Q2 were able to improve their times.
The Q3 is the time were all the remaining drivers put all their cards on the table, even those with a superior car who might have been managing their times in Q1 and Q2 push their cars to the limit in Q3. It therefore comes as no surprise that 8 out of the 9 drivers that took place in Q3 were able to improve their times.