“Sandbagging” speculation as Lewis Hamilton outpaces Max Verstappen in Bahrain
Whic🍸h cars are "sandbagging" ahead of qualifying at the F1 Bahrain Grand Prix?
168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Lewis Hamilton’s impressive pace compared to 168澳洲5最新开奖结果:Max Verstappen on Thursday in Bahrain comes amid a warning abꩵout “sandbagging”.
Hamilton topped the timesheets in a Mercedes 1-2 in the second practice session at the F1 Bahrain Grand Prix.
Red Bull’s Max Verstappen could only manage P6 in FP2 but the true potential of every car on the grid may still be a m🙈ystery, ahead of qualifying.
Verstappen was 🍒+0.47𝕴7 off Hamilton’s top time of 1:30.374 - only slightly ahead of Haas’ Nico Hulkenberg.
Damon Hill reacted on Sky Sports: “T🦂he Red Bull is not one tenꦺth quicker than the Haas!
“Exciting, fantastic🐠. I do tඣhink there is something in this.
“I think you have to take a lot of fuel out for Max to be a 🎉lot quicker than the Mercedes.
“Everyone wanᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚts to show what they are capable of doing.
“They are all sandbagging a bit!
“൩I thought the Mercedes looked nice. It’s not jittering around. I think they’ve done some work on their set-up.”
Naomi Schiff added: “Is that realistic or not? We still don’t kno꧅w.
“Toto Wolff used some colourful language in the tea🎀m principals’ press conference to describe when things will be more realistic - and that’s in qualifying.
“But it’s already positive news. We saw in testing that Lewis had a strong race run and now we’ve seen him do a quick💝 qualy run.
“It’s looking positive for Mercedes and also for Aston Marꩲtin.
“Theꦑy ꧟were quickest on the mediums in FP1 and were best of the rest in FP2.”
Mercedes entered the first day of practice in Bahrain with George Russell warning that old ‘bouncing’ problems may be rearing their ugly headꦺ again in the new W15.
“That’s been the🌟ir issue for the past two years,” Schiff said.
“Although they had a car with potential, when they ran it at the op🌄timum window, it generated bouncing.
“ܫIt has become better, but it’s a lot more stable.
“That was the issue that Lan𝕴do Norris had [in FP2].
“The car is nervous especial𝓰ly in these windy conditions.
“You want a ꧒car that is predictable, and “[Mercede♑s] seem to have one that is quite stable.”
Hill, who watched Hamilton top FP2 from inside the Mercedes hospitality, said: “They are all very calm about it. It’s 𓃲lovely to see that name back up there.”
Schiff said about the unusual results on Thursday: “The pecking order is changing. The R🎃Bs are quick, Stake moved forwar💮d.
“It is tight and you have to get it right ꧂to make aཧ difference.”
But the below-par performance of Red Bull🎐 in the new RB20 (Sergio Perez was 10th) w🅷as unexpectedly significant and raised questions about whether they are hiding their true performance until Friday.
Even if so, Mercedes’ optimis♔tic day is a fai♉r reflection of their improvement, Schiff believes.
“We’re not sure, we✱’re not 100% sure,” she said of every car’s true pace.
“But🍷 we can look at tendencies to see that there are teams who have ta꧟ken a step forwards.
“And Mercedes are one of those.
“That, we can read into. Whether Red Bull are where they a♔re, right now? We don’t🌌 know yet.”
Hill backed Hamilton and Russell.
“I’m going to🏅 put my money where my mouth is,” he said.
“That M𝔍ercedes looks good. There is something thಞat I liked about how that car looked on track.”
James was a 👍sports journalist at Sky Sports for a decade covering everything from American sports, to football, to F1.
