In the Mirrors: Bahrain GP

As Team Brawn extend their lead at the top of the championship, it is Ferrari and BMW who are falling further back, with the latter of the two having a horrendous weekend in the desert.

Ferrari finally got a few points, but the prancing horse remains more of a limping donkey.

This weekend's surprise knockout in session one turned out to be Mark Webber, coming off the back of his second place finish in China. Of course it was not his fault, as Adrian Sutil decided to weave his Force India across the track to ruin Mark's lap. A three place grid penalty didn't seem to be a severe enough penalty for this misdemeanour that probably cost Webber about 15 places on the grid.

BMW Sauber were once again in the midfield and looking no closer to getting back to the front. This is the team that halted development of the 2008 car to work on this year's BMW, and looking at how the 2008 championship played out, they are probably regretting this decision hugely.

Nelson Piquet Jr. reached the dizzying heights of session two for the first time this year, and promptly qualified 15th. Ferrari reached the dizzying heights of session three with both cars, their best Saturday in a few weeks.

As the race began, both BMW Sauber and Felipe Massa quickly crashed, ruining their races as all returned to the pits for new noses. On their way back to the pits, the BMW's created a queue of cars that resulted in numerous overtaking manoeuvres, which shuffled up the back of the grid.

As the cars spread out a little, Mark Webber moved his way up the order, and Heikki Kovalainen found himself falling a long way back. Giancarlo Fisichella made his way up to 12th, with a good start by both Force India's.

As the race settled down, the BMW Sauber's found themselves lying right at the back; their early race damage and heavy fuel strategy compromised any chance of a fightback up the grid.

Felipe Massa encountered reliability problems, as his KERS system started acting up, meaning that any chance he had for points were now completely gone. However, Kimi Raikkonen was running in the points, so it's not all bad news at Ferrari.

Kazuki Nakajima pulls into the pits towards the end of the race as Bahrain's only retirement of the day.

Massa forced past Fisichella with a bit of wheel-banging, the winner of the 2007 and 2008 Bahrain GP's now up to an exciting 14th. Fisichella then decided to hold up Jenson Button, who was trying to lap the Italian.

Unbelievably, it takes the two final corners and the pit straight before Button is able to get past. With Sutil getting in the way of Webber in qualifying, Force India was a bit unpopular.

Despite numerous overtaking moves, Mark Webber only made it as far as 11th by the finish, one place behind Nelson Piquet Jr, who completed a race without crashing. Lewis Hamilton and Kimi Raikkonen both got solid points with under-performing cars, with their teammates both outside of the points.

BMW finish 18th and 19th out of 19, marking the teams worst ever grand prix. However, Nick Heidfeld breaks a record by finishing 25 consecutive grands prix, so its not all bad.

So, Ferrari finally gained a handful of points, BMW has gone substantially backwards, and Mclaren looked like they were getting somewhere. Unfortunately for Mclaren, tomorrow could change their entire season, as the FIA investigates the fiasco that was the Australian GP.

What punishment will they get?

I think they could be banned for a couple of races, along with a hefty fine. After all, they are still on probation from the 2007 scandal, and the $100,000,000 fine that came with it.

The Spanish GP in two weeks should be a major turning point in the season, with several teams bringing new parts. Will Ferrari and BMW be able to improve, or will Brawn continue to run away with it?