Hamilton wins in Bahrain as Raikkonen takes 2nd for Ferrari

Lewis Hamilton of Mercedes AMG took his 3^rd win of the season in Bahrain as Kimi Raikkonen finished 2^nd on the podium for Scuderia Ferrari to take his first podium since his return to Ferrari. Nico Rosberg finished 3^rd in his Mercedes AMG Petronas at the Sakhir international Circuit in Bahrain.

In a race all focused on tyre strategy and undercuts, as all the cars sprinted to the first corner, Hamilton found a comfortable lead ahead of Sebastian Vettel of Ferrari, as Raikkonen out smarted Rosberg for his 3^rd place. As DRS was enabled, Rosberg made his move on Raikkonen on lap 4 to regain his position from the Finn. Four laps later, Rosberg made the same move on Vettel’s Ferrari to take 2^nd place.

Meanwhile, Filipe Massa of Williams was forced to start from the pitlane after an electrical problem sitting on the grid. As he had to climb up the order, Massa was 10^th on lap 19 to go on to finish the race in the same position.

By lap 14, Vettel dived into the pits to change to the option tyre and undercut Rosberg who pits on next lap. Next time around, Rosberg made the same move yet again on Vettel to take the position back and Hamilton exited the pit right in front of the battle between the Mercedes and the Ferrari.

Kimi pitted on lap 17 to get on primes, as he found comfort in on the tyres to close in on Teammate Vettel. By lap 20, the Iceman was lapping quicker on harder tyres that both Mercedes and Vettel on softer compounds.

The 2^nd set of pit stops came around lap 33 as Vettel attempted and executed another undercut on Rosberg only for Vettel to run wide under pressure and hand the position to Rosberg. Vettel took a damage on front wing and dived into pits yet again to ruin his race for a nose change leaving Raikkonen to take the fight to the Mighty Mercs.

Kimi on the prime tyres, pitted on lap 41 and came out ahead of Vettel,  to get back on softer tyres and charge for Rosberg’s 2^nd place. By lap 56, Kimi closed the gap on Rosberg and moved into 2^nd place to begin chasing Hamilton. Vettel was struggling behind Bottas’ Williams in 5^th place.

Daniel Ricciardo (Red Bull Racing), Romain Grosjean (Lotus),  Sergio Perez (Sahara Force India), Daniil Kvyat (Red Bull Racing) and Felipe Massa (Williams) finished the top 10 in 6^th, 7^th, 8^th, 9^th and 10^th respectively to score the remaining points.

Jenson Button did not manage to start the race as he faces ERS problems as McLaren felt that it was safer not to run the car. Pastor Maldonado retired his Lotus and neither Torro Rossos Max Verstappen and Carlos Sainz finished the race.