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Lando Norris was reprimanded by FIA stewards after a near-miss with McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri during a late Safety Car period at the Bahrain Grand Prix. Norris said he misjudged how quickly the cars ahead had slowed after George Russell stopped on track and that he could not judge how much the field had checked up. “I guess it’s my fault,” Norris said after the incident, which sent him onto the gravel at Turn 1 and cost him several places.

The stewards said Norris drove erratically by not leaving enough margin, but they also ruled that he reacted quickly, avoided contact with Piastri, did not illegally overtake him and rejoined safely. No further action was taken beyond the reprimand. Norris was summoned for allegedly driving erratically under Safety Car conditions, leaving the track and rejoining unsafely and, or overtaking another car behind the Safety Car.

The Safety Car was triggered by stoppages involving Russell and Alex Albon. Albon was also investigated for a separate incident involving Piastri, but stewards cleared him after determining he was slowing to meet the delta time requirement. Piastri was summoned as a witness, Norris finished ninth, and Piastri recovered to sixth. Nico Hulkenberg faced a separate unsafe release probe, and Max Verstappen won the race for his first victory of the 2026 Formula 1 season and the first for the Red Bull-Ford partnership.

Lando Norris said a straight-line speed problem on his McLaren was “painful as hell” after he recovered to ninth in Malaysia, and the recurring deficit resurfaced in Bahrain qualifying. Norris said he was down on every straight and that the issue was hurting his lap times, especially in the latter part of the lap.

McLaren team principal Andrea Stella said Norris was losing about 1 to 2 kph on the straights, or roughly 0.1 to 0.2 seconds per lap, in power-limited sections. Stella said Oscar Piastri’s McLaren was not affected, and the problem may not be only a Mercedes power unit issue because chassis or drag-related factors could also be involved. He said the deficit first appeared in Azerbaijan and that Norris was slower than Piastri, Red Bull and Ferrari in those sections.

Stella said McLaren had not solved the issue over the previous two events and could not make further changes until Singapore. Norris said the team was trying to fix it, but he and the team both needed to do better, and he could not use the problem as an excuse heading into next weekend’s Singapore Grand Prix. He also said he had only himself to blame for a near miss at Turn 1 after a safety-car restart in Malaysia, when he ran wide and dropped from 11th before recovering to ninth.

Formula 1 teams’ gamble on slick tyres at the delayed Bahrain Grand Prix restart backfired, as the circuit stayed too slippery in the opening laps and intermediates proved the better choice. McLaren changed Oscar Piastri to intermediates before the standing start, but Lando Norris stayed out on slicks, and both Ferrari drivers also remained on slicks before losing ground. Charles Leclerc pitted after the first lap, while Hamilton stayed out longer on Ferrari’s call and fell back early.

Hamilton said on the radio that the track was still really wet and that it would be hard to survive on slicks, but Ferrari engineer Carlo Santi told him the circuit would dry quickly and urged him to stay out. The gamble left Hamilton 17th and more than a minute behind the leader before a safety car for Valtteri Bottas bunched the field and helped him recover. Leclerc said the rough tarmac and cooler temperatures made the track harder to read and slower to dry.

Hamilton later switched to medium tyres on lap 31, then returned to softs during a late virtual safety car and safety car period and passed Isack Hadjar for third. Norris said the slick-tyre call seemed convincing at the time because the intermediate tyre had felt shredded on his reconnaissance lap, and he later acknowledged Piastri probably made the right decision. Hamilton said Ferrari could have won if it had started him on the correct tyres, and added that the team would review the failed gamble constructively.

George Russell said his latest setback was “laughable” after a power unit failure ended his race late at the Malaysian Grand Prix in Sepang, costing him a likely podium finish and leaving his title chances against Mercedes teammate Kimi Antonelli “exceptionally unlikely.” Russell had started seventh, surged to second on the opening lap after moving quickly on intermediate tires, and later returned to second after a safety-car restart before the failure forced him to retire before the final restart. The retirement was Russell’s third DNF of the season and his second technical failure, while Antonelli’s points lead over him stood at 84.

The Malaysian problem came after another costly Mercedes setback in Bahrain, where Russell retired on lap 50 with a late power-unit failure while running in podium position. Mercedes had been second and third on lap 50 of 55, with Antonelli ahead of Russell, and Toto Wolff said he was “massively annoyed,” “not in a happy place,” and that the Bahrain race was one of his worst experiences. Wolff said the failure was not caused by the safety car and warned that more DNFs could badly hurt Mercedes’ hopes in both championships.

Mercedes also struggled for pace around the upgraded W17. Wolff said the team could not understand why the car lost performance, and both drivers said the circuit exposed weaknesses. In Sepang, Mercedes said the upgrade did not deliver the expected one-lap pace, with Antonelli qualifying fourth and Russell eighth before grid penalties moved them up one place each. Russell said tire degradation and race pace would matter more than qualifying, but the double setback left Mercedes facing pressure in the drivers’ and constructors’ battles, with 183 championship points still available.

Mercedes spent the Bahrain Grand Prix weekend trying to understand why its first major W17 upgrade of the season appeared to backfire, leaving the team confused after a sharp drop in pace from practice to qualifying. Toto Wolff said the car had been expected to gain about three tenths to half a second, but instead seemed to go backward, with more drag on the straights, too much understeer in slow corners and no clear explanation yet in the data. He said Mercedes had not been hiding pace, called the package “the big question mark,” and said the team needed homework after its first clear run outside the top three this season.

Kimi Antonelli qualified fourth and moved up to third on the grid after Isack Hadjar’s penalty, while George Russell qualified eighth and started seventh. Mercedes had led Friday practice and topped FP3 through Antonelli, but Russell said the team had failed to make progress as other cars improved. He and Wolff both said the hot, rough circuit exposed weaknesses in the package, and Antonelli said Singapore may offer a clearer read on whether the upgrade works. Wolff said Mercedes remained unsure what to expect from the race in the heat.

The race brought more frustration. Mercedes were running second and third on lap 50 of 55 before Russell retired under safety-car conditions with a power-unit failure, which Wolff said was not caused by the safety car. Antonelli apologized to Russell over the radio before finishing second, and race engineer Peter Bonnington called the retirement “a real kick in the guts” for Russell and the team. Wolff said he was “massively annoyed,” called it “one of my worst experiences,” and warned that the DNF could be costly in both championships.