Sebastian Vettel (P12): 5.5/10
How long ago that brief renaissance in Turkey now appears for Sebastian Vettel, who was back in the doldrums again at Sakhir on a circuit configuration that did Ferrari's under-performing power unit no favours. Vettel did at least manage to outperform team mate Charles Leclerc on Friday (although the Monegasque barely turned a wheel in FP2 due to a driveshaft issue), but he lost ground in final practice after which he was forced to make a precautionary engine change before qualifying, which presaged yet another failure to make it into the final top-ten shoot-out round while Leclerc went on to secure fourth place on the grid. Perhaps the replacement power unit was lacking even more speed, because after a strong first lap (he gained four places) Vettel soon found himself passed by Lando Norris, Alex Albon and Sergio Perez leaving him mired in 12th place for most of the race, with a brief spike up to seventh during the first cycle of pit stops. The middle section of the race saw him still stuck behind Norris while behind him Nicholas Latifi did his best to find a way past; once the Williams retired his place was taken by Alfa Romeo's Antonio Giovinazzi. While Norris was able to get the better of Pierre Gasly in the final laps, Vettel couldn't go with him and as a result ended up out of the points in 12th.
Pierre Gasly (P11): 7/10
Both AlphaTauris had looked strong in Friday's practice session, but it started to get away from them on Saturday. Pierre Gasly did manage to make it through to the final round of qualifying but damage to the car's floor on the kerbs meant he was only fast enough for ninth on the grid when the team had been hoping to break into the top six. At the start of the race the incident ahead between Charles Leclerc, Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez gifted him a couple of early positions. Gasly was running in a solid seventh all the way to the first round of pit stops on lap 28, which inevitably dropped him out of the top ten for a brief spell. Despite complaining of a lack of pace on Sunday, he nonetheless succeeded in recovering the lost ground by the time it came to his second stop on lap 51 just before the brief Virtual Safety Car for Nicholas Latifi's retirement. Thereafter he found himself running behind his team mate Daniil Kvyat, until the pair were separated by Valtteri Bottas following the pit stop mix-up that cost Mercedes the race. Gasly spent the final minutes of the race trying in vain to hold off Alex Albon, Lando Norris and George Russell, leaving him just short of taking home a point.
