Bahrain Grand Prix 2015: Grading Race on Strategy, Overtaking, Shocks and Drama

The 2015 Formula One Bahrain Grand Prix provided suspense and intrigue all the way to the final lap of the race.

Though the predicted Ferrari long-run pace advantage failed to materialise, Kimi Raikkonen still came within a whisker of stealing victory from Lewis Hamilton as Mercedes suffered their most serious in-race reliability problems of the year so far.

Raikkonen's challenge came after Sebastian Vettel had fallen out of contention due to a string of errors. The German ended up fifth, unable to pass Valtteri Bottas in the Williams.

But the action wasn't confined to the front—close racing and strategic battles were taking place all the way down the field.

Here, reviving a series of articles from last season, we grade the race at the Bahrain International Circuit from A to E in terms of strategy, overtaking, shocks and drama.

The man grabbing most of the attention on the overtaking front was Nico Rosberg. The German lost out to Kimi Raikkonen at the start, but repassed the Finn with a late-braking move into Turn 1 on the fourth lap.

He repeated the move on Sebastian Vettel in a more calm and refined manner to take second, but at each stop ended up back behind his countryman. Displaying an aggressive nature seldom seen, Rosberg quickly blasted through on both occasions to regain second.

His overtake after the first set of stops was especially spectacular, with sparks flying from both cars as they barrelled into the braking zone of Turn 1. Sky Sports F1's Twitter account described it as the "Move of the day."

Rosberg wasn't the only driver making up places—there was action all the way through the field.

Felipe Massa's fine recovery from the pit lane to claim a point for 10th saw him involved in a number of battles, and even Fernando Alonso got in on the action—sort of. The McLaren man unlapped himself from Kimi Raikkonen while on much fresher tyres.

Though the presence of DRS undoubtedly contributed to a number of overtakes, the zones seemed about right. More often that not, the attacking driver was helped into striking range of their rival, but they still had work to do to complete the pass.

Pre-race expectation was for the optimal strategy to be a simple two-stopper, with two runs on the quicker soft tyres followed by a final stint on the mediums.

Though most drivers followed this to the letter—despite Jenson Button's early tweeted thoughts about how he thought the race was going—a few did something a little bit different.

Kimi Raikkonen was one of those who took an alternative path, opting to take the medium tyres for his second stint. This gave him a final stint on the faster softs, enabling him to reel in the two medium-shod Mercedes.

He passed one of them to take the chequered flag in second—his fourth runner-up slot in the last six Bahrain races.

Undercuts also added a bit of strategic excitement, with a huge advantage to be had by stopping even one lap earlier. Sebastian Vettel overtook Nico Rosberg twice by doing this, but he was unable to stay ahead.

There weren't too many surprises in Sakhir. The general pecking order was entirely predictable, with Mercedes and Ferrari fighting at the front, Williams third quickest, Red Bull fourth and Lotus fifth.

Manor were slowest, McLaren didn't score, Pastor Maldonado made a couple of mistakes and a Renault engine expired in spectacular fashion—nothing new there.

But there was no safety car, a first for this year, and the performance of Sebastian Vettel managed to raise a few eyebrows. After qualifying in a fine second place, the four-time world champion's race display was far below the standard we have come to expect.

He made several mistakes, the most serious of which saw him run wide at the final turn under pressure from Nico Rosberg. He kept his foot to the floor in an effort to defend his place, ran over the kerbs at high speed and damaged his front wing.

The resulting pit stop to replace his nose dropped him behind Valtteri Bottas. The remaining laps gave us another unexpected twist as the Williams was able to stay ahead to claim an excellent fourth.

Felipe Massa's Williams failed to get moving for the formation lap, setting the scene for what would prove an occasionally exciting comeback drive.

His mid-race meeting with countryman Felipe Nasr was the highlight, the rookie producing a fine piece of race craft to get by at the exit of Turn 11—only to lose the place a few corners later when both pitted.

But the true drama in Bahrain surrounded the leading five drivers. Kimi Raikkonen's great start, Sebastian Vettel's undercutting and errors, Nico Rosberg's three overtakes and Valtteri Bottas' faultless drive to fourth really stood out before the excitement kicked up a further notch in the closing laps.

Raikkonen was flying on the quicker soft tyres, catching the leading Mercedes cars and looking like an outside bet for the win. Twin brake-by-wire failures on the W06s very nearly handed the Finn a shock victory; instead, he had to settle for second.

Though it didn't quite live up to the standards it set itself with last season's awesome race, the Bahrain Grand Prix did enough to rival Malaysia as the best of 2015 so far.

Practice produced plenty of speculation and debate, qualifying was exciting all the way up to the closing seconds of Q3, the start and opening lap featured plenty of drama and we were treated to some top class overtaking and defensive driving.

The race wasn't a perfect 10—there was no battle for the lead, few surprises and many fights for position were over before they'd even begun.

But there were large periods during which we didn't really know who was going to win, and there was usually enough going on to keep us all awake and alert.

Overall, it's a solid B for Bahrain.