Formula One Bahrain: Hot Pole on Pole Action

Dr. Mario Thiessen and Team BMW Sauber are happy campers after their better-than-expected results in Bahrain that landed Poland's Robert Kubica his first-ever pole position on the starting grid and a solid third-place at the winner's podium. His win secured BMW as the leader in the in the points for the constructors' championship.

Kubica's teammate Nick Heidfeld, whose race-rhythm was quite decent, was right behind Kubica for a fourth-place finish pushing him up to second in driver's championship points

Ferrari drivers Kimi Räikkönen and Felipe Massa were the top-2 finishers of this race. Race winner Massa and his determined driving style gave way to no mistakes while Räikkönen's patience and stamina delivered him to the second-step of the winner's podium.

The mandated absence of automatic launch and traction control is looking like the Great Equalizer this season, as these processes must be executed manually, a task failed by Lewis Hamilton, one of the most impressive performers of last season.

Hamilton, who was in a good starting position at fourth on the grid, acknowledged that he "let the team down" at the start of the race by not manually engaging into launch mode in time.

He was passed at the start by those behind him, and then soon after ran up the backside of Fernando Alonso's Renault. This resulted in the loss of the McLaren's front wing and I'm guessing a few choice Spanish cuss-words from the front-end of Alonso.

Renault's second driver, Heikki Kovalainen, finished 5th and gave us the fastest lap of the race at 1:30.193.

Judging by the closeness in championship points so far, I'm guessing that this season may be similar to last -- another nail-biter where the champion remained undecided until the very last race.

The next race can be seen live 4:30am PST on Speed TV  April 27th. It is the fourth race of the season and takes place in Spain. Word on the street is that Max Mosely is planning to attend providing his bondage gear is back from the cleaners.