2001 Bahrain Grand Prix

Report:


After a chaotic qualifying due to it's rapidly weather change, Marvin Hanf was able to clinch onto the pole-position as he was one out of the lucky four drivers who got a lap in with slick tyres.

'''The race start was crazy, but stayed clean and without carnage. Koopman lost alot of positions, while both McLaren managed a amazing recovery drive through the first corners getting themselves back into the Top 10 ranks (P7 and P10).'''

'''Tobi Kress managed a great start making up eight positions all the way onto P14 through the first corners. Olivier Panis and Fernando Alonso seemed to have some contact through-out the first corners due to them pitting early in Lap 1.'''

'''It didn't take long for the first crash, as Villeneuve who got superbly overtaken by Tobi Kress at the first longer straight shunted Kress off the track in pure frustration. Villeneuve took a five-second penalty from the accident, while Kress had to go back from P15 trying to fight his way through the field again.'''

Due to Kress just getting on track and just getting some speed on, Carrasco braked too late and hit Kress in the rear as well, with Carrasco crashing himself out of the race with that move, while Kress was able to go on undamaged.

The Benetton's delivered a great fight against the championship contender teams up there, as Huisman battled along with Schaaphok for P4 early on in the race, where Schaaphok was able to prevail and continue on his hunt for P1.

'''Later on around Lap 7 Koopman had lost the control of his BMW Williams and spun right into the wall which made him lose his whole front wing. Meanwhile Koopman's struggle, Kress ran through the track, with one fastest lap after another.'''

'''A few laps later we had to witness a horrifying crash of Isaac Belal, who had taken a kerb too hard which made his car sommersault with lots of speed into the next barrier. He was getting out of his car himself later on and got on the way to the nearest hospital to get checked through.'''

The first regular pit-stops happend, as Schaaphok tried a undercut on Faizal Mehrabi who was leading the race at the time with a very big gap infront of Marvin Hanf and Henk himself.

Henk's attempt of the undercut went very good, as he was able to catch-up alot to Hanf and Mehrabi, meanwhile he was in the pitlane Hanf was capable to overtake Mehrabi.

Laps later, everyone had pitted except the race leader Hanf, who had to defend the fresh pitted Schaaphok behind him who got onto P2 due to Mehrabi running wide.

'''Hanf was able to hold onto the lead until the bitter end, where his tyres have given up five laps before the end of the race. Schaaphok overtook him easily, and raced away from the rest from that point on.'''

'''Schaaphok brought the win home for the McLaren-Mercedes team infront of Marvin Hanf (BMW-Williams F1) and Kimi Raikkonen in the Sauber-Petronas car. Tobi Kress took the fastest lap from Koopman in the final lap as well, with a great lap time of 1:35.578s.'''