Max Verstappen claimed his first win of the 2026 Formula One season at a Bahrain Grand Prix that spent more time being delayed than it did actually racing. The rain-hit event at the Sepang International Circuit in Malaysia lost an hour and 33 minutes to farce before a single competitive lap was completed, and by the time it finally wrapped up, George Russell‘s championship hopes were effectively finished too.
Verstappen navigated the chaos to win, with Kimi Antonelli finishing second and Lewis Hamilton capping a remarkable recovery drive from 18th all the way to the final podium spot. Russell had been running third when his power unit failed with just five laps remaining, a result that leaves him 84 points behind Antonelli with only seven races left and a maximum of 183 points still available.
The race itself became a sideshow to a genuinely embarrassing malfunction. Forty minutes after the original start was pushed back for rain, Formula 1 had to abandon the grid entirely when several drivers, Verstappen and Hamilton among them, found their cars simply wouldn’t accelerate. The issue traced back to this season’s controversial 50-50 split between combustion and battery power. Mercedes test driver Anthony Davidson explained the mechanism on Sky Sports: “What’s effectively happening is if you are off throttle for too long, the turbo spools down and when the driver puts their foot back down, it uses all the engine juice. As soon as the battery goes flat, you are down to internal combustion engine power only. It’s incredibly complicated and you fall into this horrible trap where the engine can’t reaccelerate because you are being penalised by this regulation.”
The grid limped back to the pits, and despite the rain having long stopped, a further 53 minutes passed with no explanation offered before officials gave the green light to try again. By then, the track was largely dry.
A Pole-Sitter Stuck in Neutral
Verstappen, who’d started from pole, was the first to flag the problem. “I am pressing the throttle, and nothing is happening,” he said before pulling over at the side of the track, with a string of other cars suffering the same fate behind him. Once he eventually got up to speed, he couldn’t resist a reaction to the scene he passed. “Look at this,” he said over the radio, shaking his head at the stranded cars dotting the circuit.
Not everyone found it amusing. Double world champion Fernando Alonso openly questioned the decision to red-flag the session in the first place. “Why did they put out the red flag? This is racing,” he said.
The restart finally came at 4:33 p.m. local time, well over an hour behind the original 3 p.m. slot. Red Bull and Mercedes gambled on intermediate tyres, while Ferrari and McLaren opted for slicks, a call that backfired badly for both. Russell jumped from seventh to second at the start as Antonelli took the lead, while Hamilton, stuck on the wrong tyres, sank as far back as 18th and 80 seconds off the pace.
A Race That Kept Finding New Ways to Pause
Valtteri Bottas beached his Cadillac on lap nine, triggering a Safety Car that allowed the leaders to finally switch from inters to slicks, with Verstappen emerging ahead of Russell in second. He then mastered the restart to pass Antonelli outright. Russell briefly got ahead of his teammate too, only for Antonelli to reclaim second on lap 21.
A lengthy second Safety Car followed late in the race when Alex Albon’s car got stuck in gear and marshals couldn’t move it. Then came the moment that effectively ended Russell’s title bid for good, as his power unit gave out with the finish line in sight. Verstappen faced no such drama, cruising to the chequered flag 2.3 seconds clear of Antonelli, while Hamilton rounded out a strong recovery by passing Isack Hadjar late on to claim his first podium since the British Grand Prix back in July.
