The Bahrain Grand Prix was spectacular for Aston Martin, with the team who finishing seventh in last season’s championship looking like the second fastest team on the grid.
Fernando Alonso claimed his 99th podium in F1 with a P3 finish whilst Lance Stroll managed to heroically overcome his wrist injury to finish in P6.
The race almost started in disaster for the team however, as Stroll made contact with the rear of Alonso’s car at the start of the race, with Alonso being lucky to escape without a puncture.
Alonso repeatedly asked who had hit him over the course of the race but his team decided against informing the Spaniard that it was his teammate who caused the collision, potentially to keep him happy during the race.
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After seeing the incident back after the race, Alonso did not seem particularly annoyed at his teammate, with the contact coming as a result of his switchback move that he had slowed down and cut inside to execute as part of the lap one chaos.
Aston Martin team principal Mike Krack has explained the his is not concerned by the incident, suggesting that it is simply part of racing that can happen.
“These are things in F1 that can happen,” said Krack.
“Lance was fighting very hard with George [Russell] on the outside – and I don’t like to see it either, but we let them race on lap one and lap two and [so on].
“It is something that you know can happen.”
Alonso lost a couple of positions on the first lap of the Grand Prix and Krack believes that this could be down to the slow formation lap, which Max Verstappen made as long as possible.
“That is something we really need to look at, it seems in the beginning we were struggling a little bit,” he explained.
“I don’t know if it is with warm-up or whatever it is, but we need to check.
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“We haven’t really looked into it yet, we will look when [things are] calm and see how we have to handle this situation in the future.”
Whilst Krack has urged fans not to get ahead of themselves after only one race, Aston Martin look to have a real chance at securing second place in the constructors’ championship this season.
The next two races in Saudi Arabia and Australia will present different challenges for the team which will give Aston Martin a much better understanding of their potential this season.