Why Kevin Magnussen was 'pleasantly surprised' despite only finishing 13th in the 2023 F1 Bahrain GP

Kevin Magnussen was pleasantly surprised after the 2023 F1 Bahrain GP despite only finishing the race in P13. The Haas driver did not have a great race weekend as he was eliminated in Q1 while his teammate Nico Hulkenberg made it to Q3.

Magnussen started the race in P17 on hard tires, an alternate strategy that did not prove to be that fruitful for the driver.

MEET THE 2023 F1 DRIVERS 👋

Kevin Magnussen
Drives for: @HaasF1Team
AKA: K-Mag
First pole: 2022 Sao Paulo Grand Prix
Dislikes: doors

#F1 @KevinMagnussen https://t.co/mAaqUjcnRp

Compared to everybody else, Magnussen lost places at the start of the race because of the slower tire but by the end of it all, he was able to crawl his way up to P13. Looking back, the Haas driver was quite happy with the race that he had.

The Dane was not too upset about the final position as he was pleasantly surprised by the race pace shown by Haas. Talking to F1 TV post-race, he said,

“I was pleasantly surprised with the race pace – I might be wrong, maybe when I go back and look at the lap times it’s a different story. I think I started P17, and we didn’t really get the strategy right. Still, we made up a few positions and it felt like the pace was alright in terms of where we came from.

"I think we were struggling a lot in testing and also in Friday practice with tyre wear. And in the race it felt like we made a step, so that’s the positive thing.”

P13 in Bahrain. Challenging first race. But we learned a lot about the new car, and we have a long season ahead of us 👊@HaasF1Team #F1 #BahrainGP https://t.co/LvoY4p0vzv

We need to take some more steps: Kevin Magnussen

Kevin Magnussen admitted that the team needed to take steps to improve race pace because that was one area where the team was struggling the most. He said,

“Of course, it wasn’t the weekend we dreamed of, but we learned a lot and I think on our side of the garage, we had a bad qualifying, made some mistakes there in the set-up.

"I think we did some damage control in the race, in terms of getting more out of the race pace than we thought we had, and that’s one step at least. We need to take some more steps, of course, but that’s okay,”

Kevin Magnussen's teammate fared even worse in Bahrain as Nico Hulkenberg made slight contact on the first lap with Esteban Ocon and hence suffered front-wing damage.

Hulkenberg struggled from high tire degradation and hence finished the race outside of the points. Haas will be looking for better luck in the next race where tire degradation might not be a major factor.