SAKHIR: Seven-time For­m­ula One world champion Lewis Hamilton won the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix for Mercedes on Sunday after an epic battle with Red Bull’s Max Verstappen over the final laps.

The race was effectively decided when Verstappen overtook Hamilton but went too wide on a turn and was told by his team to give Hamilton the position back, as he risked a time penalty.

Verstappen still had a few laps to catch Hamilton and he almost did, finishing just 0.745 seconds behind the Mercedes driver.

Hamilton’s team-mate, Valtteri Bottas, took third but was way behind the front two.

“What a difficult race that was. Stopping early we knew was going to be difficult, but we had to cover Max. It was going to take something pretty special,” said Hamilton after his 96th career win.

“Max was all over me right at the end, but just managed to hold him off, one of most difficult races I have had for a while.”

Verstappen took a superb pole position on Saturday, the fourth of his career, and started immediately ahead of Hamilton.

Verstappen got away cleanly and held off Hamilton, while Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc made a fine overtake on Bottas but lost that position after the safety car came out on Lap 1.

Verstappen admitted: “It’s of course a shame, but you also have to see the positive. We’re putting the fight on to them (Mercedes), so it’s great to start the year like that.”

Fernando Alonso failed to finish the race on his F1 comeback with Alpine.

Published in Dawn, March 29th, 2021