Bahrain Grand Prix: How to watch qualifying and the race in the US, and what to look for

The wait is finally over – the 2023 Formula One season kicks off this weekend and it’s going to be an exciting season for many, many reasons.

For the Americans, there are many things to watch out for, with three races on American soil, an American driver for the first time in eight years and Haas, the only American team, looking to improve on their 2022 result.

Max Verstappen is the great favorite to emerge victorious, both in Bahrain this weekend and in the overall drivers’ championship, but watch out for Fernando Alonso in the Aston Martin and, of course, with the two Ferraris.

The season kicks off in Bahrain this weekend with qualifying on Saturday and the race on Sunday.

Here, dailymail.com breaks down everything you need to know, including the start time, the TV channel, all the important news, and what to look for…

When does qualification start and how does it work?

Well, you don’t have to wait long. If you’re on the East Coast, the session starts at 10 a.m., and if you’re on the West Coast, set your alarms for lights out at 7 a.m.

We’ve had a couple of practice days, but this is where the exciting action really kicks in. The ranked format has been hacked and changed a bit in recent years, but its current iteration looks like this.

The 20 drivers are sent to Q1 and have 18 minutes to try to record the fastest time. At the end of the session, the five slowest drivers are eliminated and will start 16th on the grid.

In Q2, the remaining 15 drivers start again from scratch and have 15 minutes to go out again and see who is the fastest. Once again, the slowest five are eliminated from the session and sit 11-15 on the grid for Sunday’s race.

Q3 is where it gets really exciting, with the final 10 going out for 12 minutes, deciding who will be on pole position for Sunday’s race. At the end of the session, the starting grid is set for the big one.

And when is the race on Sunday?

Exactly the same time as Saturday’s qualifying: 10am on the East Coast and 7am on the West. The race is in Bahrain, so local time it will start at 6:00pm and start just as the sun begins to set over Losail.

Each race on the F1 calendar varies in length, but Sunday’s showdown in Bahrain is 57 laps around the 5.412km circuit. In miles, that’s 3.36.

The drivers will line up in the order they qualified on Saturday, and it’s a straight shootout, 57 laps to decide the winner.

In the end, the top 10 get points in the overall season standings, with the winner getting 25 points, down to one point for the 10th-place driver.

How do I watch the action on TV?

Very easily! ESPN has just closed a new television agreement to continue showing Formula One in the United States, so all the content will be live and direct on their televisions.

Coverage of Saturday’s qualifying session begins at 9:55am on ESPN2, and then at 11:45am, the die-hard F1 fans among you can tune in to ESPN3 for Ted Kravitz’s infamous ‘Qualifying Notebook’. in which he reflects on all the action.

On Sunday, the pre-race show begins at 8:30 am EST on ESPN and ESPN+, with coverage of the race beginning five minutes before lights out at 9:55 am on the same channels.

There’s a ‘Checkered Flag’ post-race show that airs at noon Eastern on ESPN3, followed by another Ted’s Race Notebook.

What representation of the United States is there in Bahrain?

A lot… and it’s not often we’ve been able to say that about the Americans in Formula One. Logan Sargeant is set for his first race at Williams, making him the first American driver in the sport since 2015 and hopefully , the first to race a full season since Scott Speed ​​in 2006.

There is also an American team at Haas, led by team principal Gunther Steiner. If you’ve watched Netflix’s ‘Drive to Survive’, you’ll know exactly who he is.

If you’re more of a McLaren man, their team principal is Los Angeles-born Zak Brown, and the larger-than-life CEO is a huge presence for the papaya team.

At the very top of the sport, the owners, Liberty Media, are an American company, so today there is a lot of American representation throughout the sport.

DailyMail.com Guide to the Grid

What should I consider?

Well, as we head into the first race of the season, there is no shortage of news lines from the front to the back of the grid. Let’s go through them quickly…

Max Verstappen won last year’s title and it would be a big surprise if he were not dominant again, with his Red Bull dominating testing last week.

There are many positives being raised about Aston Martin, which has two-time world champion Fernando Alonso and Canadian Lance Stroll in its cars.

Stroll has been making headlines for the past few weeks after he fell off his bike during spring training, and has since had surgery on his broken right wrist. If he gets to the gridiron, he’ll drive with pins in his arm.

As mentioned, Sargeant is making his debut for Williams, but there are other rookies on the grid as well, with McLaren’s Australian Oscar Piastri making his first start, and AlphaTauri’s Nyck de Vries, a Dutchman, also making his first start.

We can’t fail to mention Ferrari and Mercedes too, with Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz back to take another bite of the icing on the famous red cars.

They came close (well, closer!) in 2022, and they hope to close the gap a bit more with Red Bull and Verstappen.

At Mercedes, seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton endured a tougher 2022 season alongside fellow Briton George Russell, and they have a strong chance of finishing third or fourth in the constructors’ championship. They will, of course, expect the prediction to be wildly wrong.