2020 Sakhir Grand Prix interactive data: lap charts, times and tyres

2020 Sakhir Grand Prix

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On lap six of the Sakhir Grand Prix, eventual winner Sergio Perez was still running 18th and last.

From there he made an improbable recovery to win. While it was clearly aided by the Safety Car, Perez had already done enough to run third behind the Mercedes drivers before it came out, and therefore stood an excellent chance of taking a podium finish even without it.

Merecedes’ shambolic attempt at ‘stacked’ pit stops for George Russell and Valtteri Bottas took care of the rest.

Perez made remarkable progress after the restart. Around the short Bahrain Outer circuit he passed four cars in the first two laps, then one more over each of the next three laps.

That early Safety Car minimised his time loss to the leaders. He also took advantage of the opportunity to get off the soft tyres he’d started on, which gave him a useful advantage over everyone else who’d started inside the top 10, except the Mercedes pair who started on mediums.

This paid off as the likes of Carlos Sainz Jnr and Daniel Ricciardo, both of which held third place at different stages, had to come in before lap 30 to swap their softs for mediums, locking them into two-stop strategies.

Sergio Perez, Racing Point, Bahrain International Circuit, 2020
Perez said he could have kept Russell behind
Lance Stroll eked his softs out until lap 42 so he could one-stop. Esteban Ocon came in the lap beforehand, having not reached Q3 and therefore started on mediums, and got ahead of Stroll.

Perez was able to stay out until lap 46 and run a set of hards to the end of the race. His victory was a remarkable recovery of 17 places from lap six.

The most fascinating ‘what if’ question of the race concerns Russell’s charge to catch Perez after the restart. Would Russell have been able to overtake him for the lead?

There seems little doubt that with his fresher, softer tyres, Russell would have got within DRS range of the Racing Point has he not pitted due to a puncture on lap 78. Although he passed the other Racing Point of Stroll earlier with little difficulty, Perez was lapping quicker than Stroll by up to half a second. It would have been a terrific fight.

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2020 Sakhir Grand Prix lap chart

The positions of each driver on every lap. Click name to highlight, right-click to reset. Toggle drivers using controls below:

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2020 Sakhir Grand Prix race chart

The gaps between each driver on every lap compared to the leader’s average lap time. Very large gaps omitted. Scroll to zoom, drag to pan and right-click to reset. Toggle drivers using controls below:

Position change

DriverStart positionLap one position changeRace position change
George Russell21-7
Valtteri Bottas1-1-7
Sebastian Vettel1341
Charles Leclerc4
Max Verstappen3
Alexander Albon1206
Carlos Sainz Jnr854
Lando Norris1999
Daniel Ricciardo732
Esteban Ocon1139
Daniil Kvyat61-1
Pierre Gasly92-2
Sergio Perez5-134
Lance Stroll1047
Kimi Raikkonen1814
Antonio Giovinazzi1411
Pietro Fittipaldi2043
Kevin Magnussen1540
Jack Aitken1721
Nicholas Latifi162

2020 Sakhir Grand Prix lap times

All the lap times by the drivers (in seconds, very slow laps excluded). Scroll to zoom, drag to pan and toggle drivers using the control below:

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2020 Sakhir Grand Prix fastest laps

Each driver’s fastest lap:

RankDriverCarFastest lapGapOn lap
1George RussellMercedes0’55.40476
2Valtteri BottasMercedes0’56.5631.15956
3Sergio PerezRacing Point-Mercedes0’56.7891.38566
4Antonio GiovinazziAlfa Romeo-Ferrari0’56.8871.48352
5Sebastian VettelFerrari0’56.9051.50152
6Daniel RicciardoRenault0’56.9791.57553
7Daniil KvyatAlphaTauri-Honda0’57.0011.59776
8Alexander AlbonRed Bull-Honda0’57.0561.65248
9Carlos Sainz JnrMcLaren-Renault0’57.1651.76176
10Pierre GaslyAlphaTauri-Honda0’57.2201.81649
11Lando NorrisMcLaren-Renault0’57.2701.86681
12Esteban OconRenault0’57.3501.94671
13Kimi RaikkonenAlfa Romeo-Ferrari0’57.3751.97152
14Lance StrollRacing Point-Mercedes0’57.3881.98485
15Jack AitkenWilliams-Mercedes0’57.3921.98852
16Kevin MagnussenHaas-Ferrari0’57.5162.11253
17Pietro FittipaldiHaas-Ferrari0’57.7422.33852
18Nicholas LatifiWilliams-Mercedes0’58.2062.80229
19Max VerstappenRed Bull-Honda
20Charles LeclercFerrari

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2020 Sakhir Grand Prix tyre strategies

The tyre strategies for each driver:

Stint 1Stint 2Stint 3Stint 4Stint 5
Sergio PerezC4 (1)C3 (46)C2 (40)
Esteban OconC3 (41)C2 (46)
Lance StrollC4 (42)C3 (45)
Carlos Sainz JnrC4 (28)C3 (27)C3 (32)
Daniel RicciardoC4 (29)C3 (26)C2 (32)
Alexander AlbonC3 (47)C2 (15)C4 (25)
Daniil KvyatC4 (27)C3 (26)C2 (34)
Valtteri BottasC3 (49)C2 (13)C2 (25)
George RussellC3 (45)C2 (17)C3 (1)C3 (15)C4 (9)
Lando NorrisC4 (20)C3 (34)C3 (33)
Pierre GaslyC4 (28)C3 (23)C2 (36)
Sebastian VettelC3 (31)C2 (23)C4 (9)C4 (24)
Antonio GiovinazziC3 (26)C2 (28)C3 (33)
Kimi RaikkonenC3 (23)C2 (31)C3 (8)C4 (25)
Kevin MagnussenC4 (26)C3 (28)C4 (33)
Jack AitkenC3 (31)C2 (23)C3 (5)C4 (28)
Pietro FittipaldiC4 (31)C3 (22)C4 (10)C4 (24)
Nicholas LatifiC4 (27)C3 (25)

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2020 Sakhir Grand Prix pit stop times

How long each driver’s pit stops took:

DriverTeamPit stop timeGapOn lap
1Alexander AlbonRed Bull23.64562
2Alexander AlbonRed Bull23.8740.22947
3Daniil KvyatAlphaTauri24.1010.45627
4Carlos Sainz JnrMcLaren24.1620.51728
5Sergio PerezRacing Point24.2140.5691
6Daniil KvyatAlphaTauri24.2320.58753
7George RussellMercedes24.2350.59078
8Lando NorrisMcLaren24.2450.60054
9Nicholas LatifiWilliams24.2970.65227
10Kimi RaikkonenAlfa Romeo24.4010.75654
11Esteban OconRenault24.4140.76941
12Daniel RicciardoRenault24.4740.82929
13Sergio PerezRacing Point24.5070.86247
14Antonio GiovinazziAlfa Romeo24.5510.90654
15Valtteri BottasMercedes24.5520.90749
16Pierre GaslyAlphaTauri24.5770.93251
17Lance StrollRacing Point24.6841.03942
18Kimi RaikkonenAlfa Romeo24.6861.04162
19Daniel RicciardoRenault24.6951.05055
20George RussellMercedes24.7081.06345
21George RussellMercedes24.7241.07963
22Sebastian VettelFerrari24.8091.16463
23Antonio GiovinazziAlfa Romeo24.8101.16526
24Carlos Sainz JnrMcLaren24.8531.20855
25Jack AitkenWilliams24.8631.21831
26Lando NorrisMcLaren24.8851.24020
27Pierre GaslyAlphaTauri25.0771.43228
28Kevin MagnussenHaas25.4661.82154
29Kevin MagnussenHaas25.4741.82926
30Jack AitkenWilliams25.6882.04354
31Pietro FittipaldiHaas25.7802.13563
32Sebastian VettelFerrari26.2162.57131
33Pietro FittipaldiHaas26.3932.74853
34Pietro FittipaldiHaas27.6814.03631
35Sebastian VettelFerrari28.0804.43554
36Kimi RaikkonenAlfa Romeo28.5184.87323
37George RussellMercedes28.7655.12062
38Jack AitkenWilliams40.02816.38359
39Valtteri BottasMercedes52.87429.22962

2020 Sakhir Grand Prix

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Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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7 comments on “2020 Sakhir Grand Prix interactive data: lap charts, times and tyres”

  1. the likes of Carlos Sainz Jnr and Daniel Ricciardo, both of which held third place at different stages, had to come in before lap 30 to swap their softs for mediums, locking them into two-stop strategies

    Didn’t realize this. So, both of them had to do their stop anyways. That they didn’t get to do so during the VSC was unfortunate (as the VSC was on for a very short time) but they would have done that stop later anyways. So Perez was going to gain these 2 places, luck or not.

    1. I have an opinion
      7th December 2020, 23:45

      Neither had to stop at this particular time, or to take on the mediums. They were trying to capitalise on the VSC for a cheap stop. Compare with Stroll, who did not stop at this time. Norris was one of the few who had appreciable degradation on the softs this early in the race. They didn’t take hards as these were still an unknown quantity, with Vettel taking them a few laps later.
      The optimum strategy was likely medium / hard (Ocon, effectively Perez, and almost Mercedes). Stroll did well with soft / medium. Hard lasting all the way to Aitken’s safety car period, followed by softs, would have been interesting.

      1. Neither had to stop at this particular time, or to take on the mediums

        I think they did. Both of them stopped very early, lap 28 / 29for mediums. Doing 60 laps on that set would have been difficult. The article also states the same, that they were locked into a 2-stopper.

        Stroll made soft / medium work because he stopped on lap 42 (13-14 laps after Sainz and Ricciardo).

  2. Interesting that the top spots were taken by those making the fewest pit stops. If you ignore perez, it looks like a really good drive from stroll (eking the softs as long as he did, holding off the field at the end on old tyres) but in reality he was comprehensively outclassed by his team mate. Perez simply frightened him off the road and then blitzed past ocon (who had a great day), while stroll never even attempted a pass.

    All in all, glad I found a stream to watch this one live and didn’t wait for the channel 4 highlights as I usually do. It makes me sad that because the race is on sky, it’s impossible for some casual non-fan channel hopping to stumble on a race like this. But that’s a rant for another day.

    1. @frood19 This seems like another race that got away from Stroll after finding himself in a great position to potentially win. In Monza he was the only driver (I think) to get a completely free pit stop at the red flag, putting him effectively in the lead at the start after Hamilton’s penalty.

      But while in that case it was a bad restart that scuppered him, in this race his pace was just lacking compared to his teammate, and he also seemed unable to make passes while Perez easily moved forward. When you consider that on lap 1 Stroll was in P6 while Perez was P18, but then that Perez had passed him on track before the safety car came out, then it doesn’t look so great for him.

  3. I do wish the the lap time chart (which says to excludes very slow laps) actually did exclude the slow laps!

    So much detail there I secured by the forest of vertical lines! *maybe* the laps with stops in them are interesting, but you can’t read them because they’re off the top. But they hide the rest of the data there.

    1. Humberto Romero
      8th December 2020, 23:22

      Stroll was unable to pass anyone! He passed Gasly right after the crash on lap one and all his positions were because other got stuck behind Albon. So RP was able to overcut everyone. Then SAI an RIC made that pit stop under VSC that ended just as they were moving into the pit lane! Stroll was always on the better tire behind Ocon and could not make it. But Albon made a great job of keeping almost everyone behind!

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