Sebastian Vettel says a "crucial" moment in his Bahrain Grand Prix victory was splitting the Mercedes drivers at the start by getting ahead of Lewis Hamilton.
Mercedes locked out the front row on Saturday, with Vettel a distant 0.4s off Valtteri Bottas' pole time. With strong long-run pace evident during Friday practice a fast start seemed vital for Ferrari and Vettel obliged, passing Hamilton around the outside of Turn 1 to claim second position early on.
Vettel then sat between the Mercedes drivers for the opening stint before peeling into the pit-lane for his bold early stop on lap 10, though he thinks the start was as important as Ferrari's strategy call.