Image source, Reuters

Red Bull team principal Christian Horner speaking to Sky Sports F1: "It's great to be back racing again. There are completely new cars, new regulations, new competitors and it looks set to be a really exciting race.

"Ferrari have obviously done a very good job, they got stuck into their car early and we obviously concentrated on last year's car, so we have come to this late.

"We can see from the data we were quicker down the straight, so had an advantage in the first sector, while the second sector we were pretty much even and in the third sector they had quicker times going through one or two of the corners.

"It's important for us to have both cars in the first two rows. We don't know if it's a one or two stop - there is so much to learn about these cars.

"We have all only had six days of testing and one race run. That's all the info we have."

On Lewis Hamilton: "Let's not write him off in this race. He is going to be pumped coming into this so he remains someone we need to watch out for."

This is what Pirelli say the teams should do and expect them to come into the pits for the first time between laps 12 and 21 and then for a second time for a late sprint on for the last 12-14 laps.

Andrew Benson
BBC Sport’s chief F1 writer in Bahrain

Race strategy is coming up on simulations as between a one- and a two-stop. Overtaking is relatively easy in Bahrain, and tyre degradation high, which tends to push teams to more stops here. Start-tyre choice is free this year and it is difficult choice between the soft and medium.

The soft has better grip off the line and a significant advantage over the first two or three laps, and an average tyre-performance delate over a stint of about 0.2-0.3secs, but then degrades faster and needs to be changed sooner. A pit stop is expected to take about 23-24 seconds in racing conditions and the heavier tyres and new prescriptive brake-drum designs have been causing a number of errors when teams have been practising. Under safety-car conditions, time loss is down to 13-14 seconds.

Tyes management was still very obvious in Friday practice and degradation was not that high, but it remains to be seen what the optimum balance between the two is on tyres designed to be more durable and resilient. Whether they are in fact that also remains to be seen.

BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra

We're back on BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra so press the play button at the top right now to listen to our team of Jack Nicholls, Formula E driver Sam Bird, Jennie Gow and Andrew Benson.

Quixoticgeek: Dunno why people were suggesting Merc were sandbagging. There's no space for sandbags in those side pods!

Ferrari driver Carlos Sainz on Sky Sports F1 during the pit walk: "Conditions have changed a bit, it's a bit warmer, the wind has rotated, so the car feels a bit different.

"But the car has felt good all weekend. I am confident and I need to see if I can translate good qualifying into good race pace."

Image source, Getty Images

What a day it is going to be for China's Zhou Guanyu, who starts his first ever Formula 1 race. He got himself into Q2 yesterday and begins 15th today.

What a story it would be if he can get himself into the points on his debut.

Tanya Smith: I am so pumped for this!! Nobody knows what's going to happen after lights out and that is the way I like it!

Daniel Bartlett: Great to see Alfa Romeo towards the front, it's like '82 all over again! Go Bottas!

It's a packed and hectic grid. Great to see.

Andrew Benson
BBC Sport’s chief F1 writer in Bahrain

Kevin Magnussen, one of the stars of qualifying in the Haas, putting it seventh on his return to F1, is among the drivers optimistic that the new technical regulations will lead to better racing. “I was following an Alpha Tauri in P2 in the long run and it’s way better following other cars this year,” he said.

“The DRS effect is also bigger than it was. I think overtaking is going to be slightly better than it used to be. The only thing that works against that is that the slipstream effect is also less. So maybe it will be kind of the same sort of margin you need to get past.”

This was how Kevin Magnussen reacted on Twitter...

Haas were one of the stories of yesterday as Kevin Magnussen, back in the team after Russian pay driver Nikita Mazepin was sacked following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, qualified seventh.

Look at Guenther's reaction to that starting spot.

Not long now...

Image source, Reuters

Matthew Murnaghan: The start of a new season always hypes me up. Will this be a record breaking year for Hamilton? Or will Verstappen prevail? Or will Ferrari make a comeback?

Ben: As much as it's good to see Ferrari back in the fold, we really do need Mercedes to find some pace as I for one am very excited at the prospect of Max v Leclerc v Hamilton in a three-way title fight in these cars with Sainz, Russell and Perez playing the dark horse role.

Sam Jones: Can’t wait for race today first chance for us to see how good all teams really are in a race and how season could plan but as we know expect the unexpected

It's set to be the biggest Formula 1 season ever with 23 races held, these are the first 10 of them...

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