Jacques Villeneuve takes aim at Lando Norris for “cracking under pressure” in Bahrain

1997 F1 world champion Jacques Villeneuve has accused Lando Norris of “cracking under the pressure” following an error-strewn Bahrain Grand Prix.

Norris finished third in Bahrain, 16.2s behind McLaren F1 teammate Oscar Piastri, who won the race.

It was a weekend full of errors for Norris, who could only qualify sixth after making a mistake on the exit of Turn 1 during his final lap in Q3.

Norris misjudged his starting position at the beginning of the race, picking up a five-second time penalty for a “false start”.

He then showed weak race craft against Charles Leclerc, getting stuck behind the Ferrari driver, which ultimately stopped him from getting ahead of George Russell for second.

Norris still leads the F1 drivers’ standings, three points ahead of Piastri, heading into this weekend’s Saudi Arabian Grand Prix.

Villeneuve shared his view of the race on his Instagram account and was critical of Norris’s display.

“Very different race to Suzuka, well there, they had to do tyre management, today, we had to do lots of pit stops, but surprisingly the soft tyres were the good ones,” he said.

“Piastri, master of the weekend, controlled qualifying, controlled the race, mostly with his teammate showing signs of cracking under pressure.

“It seems to be the story of the season, little mistakes here and there, they’re costly, but he managed to salvage the lead of the championship, but he has to pay attention now because Piastri is not far behind.”

Red Bull struggles “a trend for the rest of the season”

Red Bull struggled for pace all weekend in Bahrain.

Max Verstappen could only finish sixth after overtaking Alpine’s Pierre Gasly on the final lap.

Yuki Tsunoda scored his first points for the team but was only ninth in the end.

Villeneuve feels that Red Bull’s poor performance relative to Suzuka could be a “trend for the rest of the season”.

“Russell, always scoring good points, he’s not far [behind], very discreetly,” he added.

“Verstappen showed the limit of his car, they were hard conditions, completely different to Suzuka, it was tough, and that’s probably a trend for the rest of the season.

“But he showed early in the race that the hard tyre didn’t work, it was an awful tyre, and some drivers and teams put it on after the safety car.

“I’m not sure why because they were looking at the same results as us, and it was there, the message was there about the tyres.”