Verstappen Ends 10-Month Drought With Rain-Chaos Bahrain GP Win at Sepang

SEPANG — Max Verstappen has been chasing this one all year. On Sunday at the Sepang International Circuit, in the first Malaysian Grand Prix in nine years, he finally caught it: the four-time world champion won the rain-hit Bahrain Grand Prix from pole position, beating championship leader Kimi Antonelli and Lewis Hamilton in a wet-dry classic that was delayed more than 90 minutes, scrambled by a software failure, and decided by a late safety car. It is Verstappen's first victory of 2026, ending a 10-month drought, Red Bull's first win of the season, and — by his own telling — the first victory for Red Bull's own engine project.

THE DELAY — Before a wheel turned in anger, the race nearly unraveled twice. Torrential rain hit Sepang before the scheduled start and held the grid for more than 90 minutes, per Reuters. Then, on the formation lap, a power-unit software fault — a confluence of low engine speed, standing water, wet-weather energy-management settings and Sepang's sector demands — sapped power across a meaningful cross-section of the grid, as the Business Mirror reported from trackside. The FIA's Technical Department moved with unusual speed, exploiting the rain delay to issue an emergency software release to every competitor, stripping out the energy-limit constraint in the affected sectors and restoring full power before the green flag could fall. A full review is now underway — an admission, in the FIA's words reported trackside, that the sport's software architecture still harbors failure modes only genuinely adverse conditions can expose.

THE TYRE GAMBLE — When the race finally went, it split the field in two. Nine drivers — including Verstappen, Antonelli, George Russell and Isack Hadjar — started on intermediates. Hamilton, Charles Leclerc, Lando Norris, Oscar Piastri and Pierre Gasly gambled on slicks, and for the first few laps it looked brave: Antonelli and Russell swept past Verstappen into the first corner, and Ferrari and Norris lost places, per autoX. But the gamble was wrong. Gasly spun behind the safety car on lap one. Verstappen passed Russell on lap six and closed on Antonelli as the track dried, per autoX, and by lap 13 — Crash.net's reporting — the Red Bull was back past the Mercedes and into a lead it would not lose. Leclerc's gamble ended in contact with Nico Hülkenberg's Audi and a pit stop for a new front wing. Hamilton, more than a minute adrift early, began the long recovery that would define his afternoon.

THE SAFETY CAR — The drama wasn't done. A late safety car, triggered by Alex Albon's stranded Williams, wiped out Verstappen's lead and set up a four-lap sprint to the finish, per Citi Sports. He nailed the restart — and while the field fought behind him, Russell's title hopes went up in smoke: the Mercedes stopped late with a suspected power-unit issue, on lap 50 per Frontstretch (with five laps left, per Reuters), promoting Hamilton into third. It was Russell's first non-score since Spa, and it stretched the gap to Antonelli to 84 points with six or seven races remaining.

HAMILTON'S DRIVE — The other story of the day was the seven-time champion's rescue job. Hamilton was toward the back of the grid after a disastrous start, with Ferrari's slicks gamble majorly backfiring, per Crash.net — but he fought his way through the field with an impressive recovery drive and came home third, his first podium since Silverstone. "He had been over a minute adrift early in the race," Crash.net wrote, making this one of the drives of the season. Charles Leclerc took fourth in the other Ferrari, ahead of Red Bull's Isack Hadjar and McLaren's Oscar Piastri. Liam Lawson was seventh for Racing Bulls, while Fernando Alonso finished eighth to secure Aston Martin's best result of the season so far. Lando Norris dropped to 11th after taking to the gravel to avoid hitting teammate Piastri during the late safety car, before the reigning world champion fought back to salvage ninth — ahead of Arvid Lindblad, who recovered from the back of the grid to score the final point in tenth.

THE FINE PRINT — Verstappen added the fastest lap for good measure — 1:38.220 on lap 55 — and Gabriel Bortoleto's own points hopes disappeared with a 10-second penalty for causing a collision with Carlos Sainz at the earlier safety car restart. "We had a very complicated and tough start to the year with all sorts of problems and just not being competitive enough," Verstappen said in the FIA press conference, per Frontstretch. "But throughout the year, the team has been working very hard to understand our issues and bring good performance upgrades to the car and make it more driveable. Step by step, we've been getting closer and closer, and today, and of course especially this whole weekend, we've been really in good form," Verstappen said in the FIA press conference, per Frontstretch. On the engine, he added: "also have our first victory for our own engine. I mean, it's an incredible project with a lot of partners and a lot of people that are dedicated to be where we are now. So, yeah, fantastic feeling."

THE STANDINGS — Antonelli leaves Malaysia with 320 points to Russell's 236 — an 84-point cushion, per Crash.net and Frontstretch. Hamilton is third on 214, ahead of Leclerc (191), Norris (188) and Verstappen (188). In the constructors', Mercedes rules the roost on 556 points with a 151-point lead over Ferrari on 405, while McLaren remain a distant third on 316 after a difficult weekend for the former champions; Red Bull is fourth on 298, per Frontstretch. Nine years ago, Verstappen started third at Sepang and beat Hamilton to win the 2017 Malaysian Grand Prix. This time he arrived on pole, survived just about everything Malaysia could throw at him, and won again — the drought is over, and with six or seven rounds left, the top of the table just got a lot more interesting. Follow the run-in with Previously's sports coverage and the sports hub.