2017 Bahrain Grand Prix tyre strategies and pit stops

2017 Bahrain Grand Prix

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An early Safety Car period prompted most drivers to use two-stop strategies in the Bahrain Grand Prix. Pascal Wehrlein was the only exception.

2017 Bahrain GP in pictures
On the opening laps of the race Bottas was off the pace on his over-pressured super-soft tyres. He held up a queue including Sebastian Vettel, Lewis Hamilton and the Red Bulls.

Once Vettel pitted he was immediately over two seconds per lap faster on another set of super-soft tyres. Red Bull, however, found they lacked pace after putting the softs on. Daniel Ricciardo switched back to the super-softs for his final stint but was too late to stop Kimi Raikkonen from beating him to fourth.

Hamilton also made a late pit stop but didn’t take the super-soft tyres despite having a fresh set available. Mercedes seemingly couldn’t make them last long enough at a sufficiently quick pace to make them a worthwhile choice. Hamilton’s pace began to drop off just four laps into his soft tyre stint.

2017 Bahrain Grand Prix tyre strategies

The tyre strategies for each driver:

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2017 Bahrain Grand Prix pit stop times

How long each driver’s pit stops took:

Stint 1Stint 2Stint 3
Sebastian VettelSuper soft (10)Super soft (23)Soft (24)
Lewis HamiltonSuper soft (13)Soft (28)Soft (16)
Valtteri BottasSuper soft (13)Super soft (17)Soft (27)
Kimi RaikkonenSuper soft (12)Super soft (25)Soft (20)
Daniel RicciardoSuper soft (13)Soft (26)Super soft (18)
Felipe MassaSuper soft (13)Soft (24)Soft (20)
Sergio PerezSuper soft (13)Super soft (23)Soft (21)
Romain GrosjeanSuper soft (12)Super soft (19)Soft (26)
Nico HulkenbergSuper soft (13)Soft (23)Super soft (21)
Esteban OconSuper soft (11)Super soft (26)Soft (20)
Pascal WehrleinSuper soft (11)Soft (45)
Daniil KvyatSuper soft (13)Soft (28)Super soft (15)
Jolyon PalmerSuper soft (13)Soft (24)Super soft (19)
Fernando AlonsoSuper soft (13)Soft (23)Super soft (18)
Marcus EricssonSoft (33)Super soft (17)
Carlos Sainz JnrSuper soft (12)Super soft (0)
Lance StrollSuper soft (8)Soft (4)
Max VerstappenSuper soft (11)
Kevin MagnussenSuper soft (8)
Stoffel Vandoorne
DriverTeamPit stop timeGapOn lap
1Felipe MassaWilliams24.24037
2Sebastian VettelFerrari24.3140.07433
3Sergio PerezForce India24.3320.09213
4Esteban OconForce India24.5050.26537
5Valtteri BottasMercedes24.5400.30030
6Sergio PerezForce India24.6300.39036
7Esteban OconForce India24.6640.42411
8Sebastian VettelFerrari24.7020.46210
9Fernando AlonsoMcLaren24.7230.48336
10Lance StrollWilliams24.9150.6758
11Fernando AlonsoMcLaren24.9220.68213
12Romain GrosjeanHaas24.9650.72531
13Carlos Sainz JnrToro Rosso25.0010.76112
14Romain GrosjeanHaas25.0750.83512
15Nico HulkenbergRenault25.1350.89536
16Max VerstappenRed Bull25.1740.93411
17Daniel RicciardoRed Bull25.2000.96039
18Daniil KvyatToro Rosso25.2040.96413
19Daniil KvyatToro Rosso25.2461.00641
20Daniel RicciardoRed Bull25.3121.07213
21Marcus EricssonSauber25.5761.33633
22Felipe MassaWilliams25.7041.46413
23Kimi RaikkonenFerrari25.8561.61637
24Jolyon PalmerRenault26.4202.18037
25Kimi RaikkonenFerrari26.4302.19012
26Pascal WehrleinSauber26.5422.30211
27Nico HulkenbergRenault26.6342.39413
28Jolyon PalmerRenault27.4663.22613
29Valtteri BottasMercedes28.3684.12813
30Lewis HamiltonMercedes30.6826.44241
31Lewis HamiltonMercedes30.6876.44713

2017 Bahrain Grand Prix

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Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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10 comments on “2017 Bahrain Grand Prix tyre strategies and pit stops”

  1. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
    16th April 2017, 21:21

    Are we going to have another year of Williams dominating the pit stop times? That will be nice to see. It would be good if we could also see the actual pit stop time too though. I have a feeling that that used to be the case. Have they stopped providing this information?

    1. @thegianthogweed, Actually Force India did the best stops, not Williams. Consistency is more important than best time for a single pit stop.

      1. Ben Rowe (@thegianthogweed)
        16th April 2017, 23:04

        I was only talking about the actual pit stop times. And last year, Williams were easily the best team at this. They were very consistent too.

        1. But @me4me is right. If you look, Force India have all their four stops in the top seven fastest stops, whereas one Williams stop is 22nd and one tenth. To me, that makes Force India the better pit crew (at this race), even if the fastest stop was Williams.

  2. Why did Hamilton run such a long second stint? It seems to me that two 22-lap stints should have been faster in theory.
    I also cannot really explain why they put Bottas on supersofts at the first stop after his dreadful first stint.

    1. @f1infigures Exactly, I was certain they would put Hamilton on a supersoft after waiting so long.

      1. Sundar Srinivas Harish
        17th April 2017, 3:31

        It was a splitting strategy. Merc didn’t seem to realize that the soft was doing better until they saw the dreadful second stint that Bottas had.

      2. I think the Mercedes are too harsh on the Super Softs, this Lewis was pitted for Softs instead.

  3. They might have been waiting to clear some traffic, I can’t remember if he came out in front of someone (backmarkers) or not. In any case having more life in the tyres makes sense in case there’s a late safety car or something, seeing as it was unlikely he could catch Vettel.

    His middle stint was pretty good anyway, his times weren’t dropping off and I guess it allowed him to run at 100% in the last stint instead of having to run to a delta?

    1. Oops, that was as a reply to @f1infigures above.

Comments are closed.