Sakhir Qualifying Analysis: Where Câmara made the difference to take pole ahead of Voisin

Rafael Câmara took his second Pole Position of the season in Bahrain, beating Rodin Motorsport’s Callum Voisin to the top spot in Qualifying by 0.156s in an entertaining battle between the pair.

The TRIDENT driver had led the way early on in Free Practice with a 1:50.984, but it was not until his final lap of the day that he topped the timesheets in the 30-minute sessions.

Câmara’s 1:49.214 proved to be too good to beat, but just how did the Brazilian do it, and how did he make the difference over a very fast Voisin?

THE START OF QUALIFYING

There were a couple of different strategies being used in Qualifying, one of those saw the drivers run used tyres on their first push laps, so as to save a brand-new set for one of the races.

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TRIDENT and Rodin were two teams to employ this strategy which Voisin admitted in the press conference afterwards was a bit of a risk.

This is because Voisin’s first lap, which was 0.796s off Campos Racing’s Nikola Tsolov’s leading time of a 1:50.506, was only good enough for P12

This is risky because the teams and drivers tend to want to get a competitive early time on the board, just in case their next push laps are affected by traffic or a Yellow or Red Flag.

For Câmara it was even more dangerous because he aborted his first attempt, choosing to return to the pit lane, meaning he had no representative time on the board before the second runs.

THE SECOND SET OF LAPS

New tyres on, all 30 drivers out on track and there were several improvements across the board. But it was Voisin that took provisional pole with a 1:49.882, ahead of MP Motorsport’s Alessandro Giusti by just 0.023s, while Câmara was third, 0.162s off the top time.

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Interestingly enough, looking at the sector times, it was clear where the Brazilian had to improve to catch his Rodin rival.

Voisin was much quicker than Câmara through the first two sectors on this lap, going purple in the first. He was actually 0.196s ahead entering the final portion of the lap, but the TRIDENT driver was 0.034s quicker through the third sector.

Even Giusti, in second, was 0.124s off Voisin in the first sector, but managed to claw 0.101s back in the final two sections of the lap to end up just 0.023s behind in P2.

So, for Câmara, it was clear that he had to find a way to match or better Voisin in the opening two sectors, while keeping his advantage in the final part of the lap.

THE FINAL ATTEMPT

Six drivers separated Câmara and Voisin as they set of on their last attempts of Qualifying with the former at the head of a small group of cars, while the latter was at the rear.

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The Briton once again set the fastest first sector with a 34.577s, but on this occasion, his rival for pole was right there with him, Câmara just 0.014s behind.

The Scuderia Ferrari Academy member had found time in the first sector, but he had to keep it up in the very technical second part of the lap.

Not only did he do that, but Câmara was actually quicker than Voisin through this section, his 47.029s was 0.031s faster. This meant going into the final sector, just 0.017s separated them.

But this is where the TRIDENT rookie made the difference. He was already strong in the final few corners based on the previous lap, but he went even better this time around, completing a 27.594s, and pulling out 0.139s on Voisin, who coincidentally also set a personal best time in the final sector.

This trend continued in the Feature Race when they ran in first and second place, with Câmara consistently quicker in the final sector across the 21 racing laps.

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But arguably the significant difference the 19-year-old made in Qualifying was finding a way to be closer to Voisin in the first two sectors.

Being able to match his Rodin rival’s times through his strong sections, while still maintaining his advantage in the last segment put him on top and set him on his path to a second Feature Race victory of the season.