F1 picked up where it left off with a dramatic season opener which saw Ferrari's first win in 46 races and a furious Max Verstappen forced to retire

• Formula One picked up where it left off last year with a dramatic opening race of the 2022 season.
• Ferrari's Charles Leclerc won the race after an early battle with world champion Max Verstappen.

Ferrari returned to the top step of the Formula One podium for the first time in 46 races as Charles Leclerc won a dramatic opening race of the 2022 season in Bahrain.

Leclerc started on pole and led for the entire race, but that does not tell the full story of a frenzied race at the Bahrain International Circuit. The Monaco-native battled with defending world champion Max Verstappen, whose race ended prematurely when he suffered an engine failure with just a handful of laps to go.

A furious Verstappen, who was in second place at the time, had to retire on lap 54 of the race, yelling at his engineers that he had an issue with his Red Bull car.

"What is going on with the battery?" — Verstappen asked angrily shortly before his retirement. The issue, however, appeared to be engine-related rather than battery-related, although exactly what went wrong is unclear.

The same issue befell Verstappen's teammate Sergio Perez, who had to retire after spinning and losing power on the final lap of the race.

Red Bull's misfortunes benefited Ferrari, allowing the Italian team to take a one-two, with Leclerc's Spanish teammate Carlos Sainz finishing second and matching his highest ever finish in F1.

While Leclerc led for almost the entire race, there was a period early on when Verstappen put him under severe pressure. The Dutchman overtook Leclerc twice at turn one on consecutive laps, but Leclerc was able to regain the place quickly both times, and began to pull away as the race went on.

A late safety car threatened to change the outcome when Pierre Gasly's AlphaTauri caught fire in almost the exact same spot where Romain Grosjean suffered a fiery wreck in 2020. The safety car bunched the field, giving Verstappen an opportunity to take the lead late on, just as he did in Abu Dhabi in December 2021.

Leclerc, however, marshaled the restart perfectly, pulling away easily from Verstappen and ultimately securing a comfortable victory, his third in F1 and his first since winning in Italy in 2019. The win was Ferrari's first as a team since Sebastian Vettel won the 2019 Singapore Grand Prix.

"The last two years have been incredibly difficult for the team," Leclerc said after the race. "We knew it would be a big opportunity for us and the guys have done such an incredible job in building this amazing car.

"Starting in best way possible. Pole position, victory, fastest lap, one two with Carlos, we couldn't have hoped for any better."