Carlos Sainz says he enjoyed his fight against Charles Leclerc in F1 Bahrain GP as he feels that tight line-up is helping McLaren.

It was a hectic F1 Bahrain certainly but there were fights still to entertain the fans. One of them had McLaren’s Sainz fighting back up having qualified lower down the order. He, in fact, passed Ferrari’s Leclerc at Turn 1, but the Monegasque stayed with him.

Leclerc tried a move at the exit of Turn 3 and even went tiny bit off but didn’t have the pace and an eventual moment at Turn 4 allowed Renault’s Daniel Ricciardo to pass him as well. Sainz eventually finished fifth behind McLaren teammate Lando Norris.

Speaking about the brief fight, Sainz stated that he enjoys fighting against Leclerc. Not just him, he feels the same about Norris and Ricciardo too. “I got a couple of good moves on Charles, honestly, it is always a pleasure to fight with Charles,” he said to TV media.

“We are giving each other enough room, people like Lando, Charles, Daniel, it is good fun because we come from the same school of younger ones and we give each other enough room but at the same time have a good fight.

“Overall, it was a very strong race for me, the first stint on the soft tyre, making it stick and last it more than the medium, and overtake all the cars. Probably, it was one of the strongest races for me in a long time and I got myself back in the fight, to another Top 5 after starting from back of the grid,” summed up Sainz.

The Spaniard and Norris gained due to the retirement of Racing Point’s Sergio Perez, which was was crucial for them as McLaren is back in third with 171 points over the Silverstone-based outfit at 154. Renault remains fifth with 144 points, with two F1 races to go.

In fact, Sainz credited the tightness between him and Norris, which is helping McLaren. They are separated by just the one point in the drivers’ standings, where the Brit is seventh with 86 and the Spaniard is ninth with 85 – same as Alexander Albon.

“What is clear that having two drivers as tight as we are is helping the team move forward and I think the race is a good demonstration of having two solid drivers helps with good points,” said Sainz. “Obviously, there are a lot of variables for our 2020 position.

“But the main focus is to beat each other and at the same time put good performances for the team and that’s what is keeping his P3 in the championship,” summed up Sainz. Teammate Norris was happy to have a Top 5 finish in seven races.

Before the grand prix, he wasn’t expecting the result but was happy eventually. “From our race, we weren’t expecting this result,” said Norris. “We had a plan to go out and achieve and we focused on ourselves and our own races.

“We had a very good start for both of us, that helps well for the layout of the race. So we will take it and the hard work paid off. We took advantage of Perez’s failure, we have had unlucky races in the past where we were up for some good points, maybe not a podium but it can happen to any of us,” summed up Norris.

Here’s the video of the fight between Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc: https://www.formula1.com/en/video/2020/11/2020_Bahrain_Grand_Prix__Sainz_and_Leclerc_battle_in_the_desert.html

Here’s what happened between Sebastian Vettel and Charles Leclerc