F1 Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia 2026 prediction: race winner probablities
Kimi Antonelli still leads the Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia market, but Max Verstappen's Friday pace and Ferrari's FP2 speed have opened the race up at Sepang.
Motorsports
By Chris Old
Formula 1's return to Malaysia has already made the race-winner picture considerably more complicated.
Max Verstappen topped FP1 by almost four tenths from George Russell, then Charles Leclerc put Ferrari first in FP2 ahead of Isack Hadjar and Lando Norris.
Verstappen finished fourth in the second session without using the soft tire at all, while Mercedes ended only seventh and eighth after both of its qualifying simulations were compromised.
The long runs make Friday even more interesting. Verstappen produced the fastest representative FP2 average at 1:44.808 on the medium tire, with Norris at 1:44.989, Leclerc at 1:44.995 and Russell at 1:45.208.
Different compounds and fuel loads prevent that from becoming a definitive race hierarchy, but Red Bull's pace was strong enough to give the headline times genuine substance.
It comes only six days after Verstappen pushed Russell to within 0.196 seconds at the finish in Azerbaijan. Russell's victory cut Antonelli's F1 Drivers' Championship lead to 66 points, while Verstappen and Red Bull produced another weekend suggesting the gap to Mercedes is much smaller than it was earlier in the season.
The market nevertheless keeps Antonelli narrowly on top at 41%, only three percentage points ahead of Verstappen and seven ahead of Russell.
Friday has provided plenty of evidence for questioning the size of those gaps without providing enough to overturn them.
And yes, this really is Bahrain's Grand Prix being held in Malaysia. The original April round did not take place amid the situation in the Middle East, with Formula 1, the FIA and the Bahrain and Malaysian governments later agreeing to stage the event at Sepang from October 2-4. It is F1's first race at the Malaysian circuit since 2017.
This article is for informational purposes only and should not be construed as financial or investment advice. Past performance does not guarantee future results.
F1 Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia 2026 weekend snapshot
Practice
Practice 1: Friday, October 2 — 12:30 p.m. MYT / 12:30 a.m. ET
Practice 2: Friday, October 2 — 4:00 p.m. MYT / 4:00 a.m. ET
Practice 3: Saturday, October 3 — 12:30 p.m. MYT / 12:30 a.m. ET
Race weekend
Qualifying: Saturday, October 3 — 4:00 p.m. MYT / 4:00 a.m. ET
Race: Sunday, October 4 — 3:00 p.m. MYT / 3:00 a.m. ET
Race distance: 56 laps / 310.408 km
Context
Drivers' Championship leader: Kimi Antonelli — 302 points
Teams' Championship leader: Mercedes — 538 points
Last race winner: George Russell — Azerbaijan Grand Prix
Most recent F1 winner at Sepang: Max Verstappen — 2017 Malaysian Grand Prix
The championship context still gives Mercedes enormous weight. Antonelli leads Russell 302-236, while Mercedes has scored 538 points and won 11 of the first 15 Grands Prix. Russell's Baku victory stopped Antonelli's run of consecutive wins at Monza and Madrid, but Mercedes remains comfortably the season's most successful team.
Sepang presents a very different technical problem. The 5.543-kilometer circuit mixes long straights with heavy braking, slower hairpins and fast, loaded corners where sustained lateral grip matters.
Heat and humidity increase the physical demand while also placing tires under significant stress, and the FIA has already issued a heat-hazard declaration for the weekend.
Pirelli has brought the C2, C3 and C4 compounds, but Friday suggested the more important story may be how quickly teams use them up rather than which compound produces the quickest single lap.
McLaren described degradation as consistently high and said the numbers naturally point toward a two-stop race if conditions remain dry.
Then there is Malaysia's weather. Formula 1's official forecast called for hot and humid conditions with the possibility of rain, and Sepang has a long history of thunderstorms developing quickly.
That adds another strategic layer to a weekend where the dry-tire picture already looks relatively open.
Who will win the 2026 F1 Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia?
Prediction markets for Bahrain Grand Prix 2026 Race Winner currently make Kimi Antonelli the favorite at 41%, with Max Verstappen second at 38% and George Russell third at 34%.
Kimi Antonelli — 41%
Max Verstappen — 38%
George Russell — 34%
Lando Norris — 26%
Charles Leclerc — 17%
Oscar Piastri — 14%
Lewis Hamilton — 14%
Isack Hadjar — 12%
Market data as of October 2, 2026. For the latest market-implied probabilities, check the OG app.
The top of the market is unusually compressed.
Antonelli has the strongest season-long argument, but Friday has not yet produced evidence that he or Mercedes has the strongest car at Sepang. He was fifth in FP1 and eighth in FP2, while Russell moved from second to seventh.
Those FP2 positions need context. Antonelli had his qualifying attempt deleted for track limits and Russell aborted his soft-tire lap in the final sector, so neither Mercedes driver's headline time represents a clean qualifying simulation.
Verstappen's fourth place is misleading in the opposite direction.
He never used the soft tire in FP2. His 1:37.785 came on the medium, only 0.257 seconds behind Leclerc's soft-tire benchmark, after he had already led FP1 by 0.383 seconds. Red Bull then had the quickest representative long run through Verstappen.
That makes the 41%-38% Antonelli-Verstappen split much easier to understand than the raw season standings alone would suggest.
Russell at 34% remains firmly in the same group. He won in Baku, took pole there by the largest margin of the season and arrived in Malaysia with a significant Mercedes upgrade package.
Friday was less convincing, but his long-run average was still within four tenths of Verstappen despite the W17 not appearing completely settled.
Norris at 26% and Leclerc at 17% then make up a second layer that Friday arguably brought closer to the favorites.
Leclerc led FP2. Norris finished only 0.137 seconds behind him and McLaren made a major step from a difficult FP1, where Norris and Piastri had been 12th and 11th. Their race simulations were also close enough to Red Bull that neither Ferrari nor McLaren can be dismissed as a qualifying-only threat.
His 1:37.528 put him 0.099 seconds ahead of Hadjar and 0.137 clear of Norris, with Hamilton also fifth to give Ferrari two cars inside the leading group.
But the cleanest qualifying conclusion from FP2 may be that we do not yet have a clean qualifying order.
Verstappen's time came on the medium rather than soft. Russell aborted the final sector of his soft attempt and Antonelli lost his lap for track limits. That leaves meaningful performance hidden inside three of the four cars occupying the top of the race-winner market.
Hadjar is the other obvious Friday standout.
He finished third in FP1 and second in FP2, providing a second Red Bull datapoint that suggests Verstappen's performance was not purely driver-specific. Hadjar's own race prospects are compromised by a five-place power-unit grid penalty, but his pace remains useful when trying to establish what the RB22 can do around Sepang.
McLaren presents a different picture. Norris and Piastri initially tried different rear-wing configurations in FP1 and struggled, before both moved substantially forward in the second session.
Norris finished third and Piastri sixth, although Norris still described the car as struggling more than he would like.
FP3 therefore matters more than usual. Ferrari has the Friday benchmark. Red Bull appears to have more one-lap performance than Verstappen's fourth place shows.
Mercedes has not completed a representative soft-tire lap with either driver, while McLaren improved enough between sessions to remain firmly involved.
There is no convincing pole favorite yet.
Who has the edge on long-run pace?
Verstappen, at least on the evidence Friday provided.
His representative FP2 long-run average was 1:44.808, compared with 1:44.989 for Norris, 1:44.995 for Leclerc and 1:45.208 for Russell.
The different tire compounds prevent a straight one-to-one comparison — Verstappen was on the medium while Norris, Leclerc and Russell were on softs — but Red Bull was competitive enough across the stint to reinforce what the shorter runs had already suggested.
That is potentially more significant than FP1. A single fastest practice lap can come from tire choice, track evolution, fuel level or simply one driver putting together the cleanest lap.
Verstappen looking competitive on both the short and long runs begins to suggest something more fundamental about how the RB22 is working around Sepang.
Norris and Leclerc were effectively inseparable on the representative averages.
McLaren's own assessment was cautiously positive: the MCL40 made a sizeable step between sessions and its high-fuel pace was described as reasonable, although the team also admitted the exact long-run hierarchy remained difficult to establish.
Tire degradation is the complication. The surface proved rougher and grippier than McLaren had forecast, producing consistently high degradation throughout Friday.
If that persists, outright pace over the first four or five laps of a stint may matter less than how the tires behave over 12, 15 or 20 laps.
That could help explain why the market remains relatively broad. Red Bull has the best Friday long-run number; Ferrari and McLaren are close, and Mercedes has enough season-long evidence that one slightly weaker Friday cannot override what the W17 has done over 15 races.
Saturday should establish whether the current gap is real or whether Mercedes simply had the least representative Friday program among the leading teams.
Is Red Bull now genuinely fast enough to win on merit?
This is the biggest question created by Friday.
Verstappen's recent results had already suggested Red Bull was moving closer. He finished third at Monza, second in Madrid and then missed victory in Baku by only 0.196 seconds.
He has still not won a Grand Prix in 2026, but the gap between being a podium threat and actually fighting for victories has been shrinking.
Sepang produced stronger evidence again. Verstappen led FP1, remained only 0.257 seconds from the fastest FP2 time despite staying on the medium and then produced the strongest representative long run.
He described the day positively, although he acknowledged that there were still areas to understand.
Hadjar strengthens the argument. Second in FP2 and third in FP1 suggests Red Bull has found a useful operating window for both cars rather than Verstappen simply driving around an underlying problem.
Hadjar also arrives from a podium in Azerbaijan, although his five-place grid penalty means his own route through Sunday is substantially harder.
The remaining question is qualifying. Verstappen did not run the soft tire on Friday afternoon, so we still do not know exactly what Red Bull has over one lap relative to Ferrari, McLaren or Mercedes.
If FP3 confirms the same balance and Verstappen can qualify near the front, his 38% probability has a much stronger sporting foundation than it would have had a few races ago.
Can Ferrari turn Friday speed into a complete weekend?
Leclerc has given Ferrari the result it wanted from FP2. The challenge is doing something with it.
His 1:37.528 was the fastest Friday lap, Hamilton finished fifth and Leclerc's representative long-run average was only six thousandths slower than Norris. Ferrari therefore showed performance over both a qualifying-style lap and a longer stint.
That makes this a more convincing Friday than simply topping one practice session.
The gap to Verstappen on the long run was still there, but it was less than two tenths on average and involved different compounds. Ferrari is not trying to explain away a fast lap attached to weak race pace.
Sepang also gives the SF-26 a very different test from Baku. The car needs enough efficiency for the two long straights, but the lap is dominated more heavily by long loaded corners and sustained tire energy than Azerbaijan.
Ferrari's ability to keep Leclerc and Hamilton competitive through those sequences may matter more than outright minimum-drag performance.
The difficulty has been consistency. Ferrari has won twice this season but has not matched Mercedes over the calendar as a whole.
Strong Fridays have not always translated into pole positions or Sunday victories, and the market still reflects that: Leclerc sits at 17% and Hamilton 14% despite Ferrari currently owning the fastest practice lap.
If Leclerc stays near the front in FP3 and qualifying, those numbers become much harder to ignore.
What has Mercedes actually learned from its new upgrade?
Mercedes arrived in Malaysia with a major development package and considerable confidence after Russell's dominant Baku weekend.
Friday did not provide the clean comparison the team would have wanted. Russell finished second in FP1, but neither Mercedes completed a representative soft-tire simulation in FP2: Antonelli's lap was deleted and Russell aborted his own attempt.
Their final seventh and eighth positions therefore exaggerate how far away they may be over one lap.
The long-run numbers are more meaningful. Russell averaged 1:45.208, around four tenths slower than Verstappen and just over two tenths behind Norris and Leclerc.
That is not disastrous, particularly on the first day of running with a new package, but it does suggest Mercedes has work to do overnight if it wants to reproduce the control it showed in Baku.
The package itself was intended to strengthen the W17 through the final part of the championship, with Russell saying before the weekend that he hoped it could extend Mercedes' advantage over its rivals.
Sepang is therefore a useful test. Mercedes has already shown throughout 2026 that it can recover from difficult Fridays, and the new package should give the team more scope to adjust overnight.
The real test is whether FP3 brings the W17 back toward the front on both qualifying pace and tire management rather than simply producing a cleaner headline lap.
Russell's 34% and Antonelli's 41% remain defensible because the season-long evidence is so strong. Friday just made them look much less secure than they did before the cars ran.
Can McLaren turn its FP2 recovery into a genuine race challenge?
McLaren's Friday was a useful reminder of why practice needs context.
Norris and Piastri were only 12th and 11th in FP1, with both drivers struggling for grip and the team experimenting with different rear-wing configurations.
By FP2, Norris had climbed to third and Piastri sixth, while McLaren reported a substantial improvement in the car's balance and overall operating window.
The longer runs were more encouraging still. Norris' representative average was effectively identical to Leclerc's and less than two tenths slower than Verstappen's.
That keeps McLaren in the race-winning conversation even if the MCL40 did not look like the outright benchmark over a single lap.
The main concern is degradation. McLaren described the surface as rougher and grippier than expected, with tire degradation consistently high across Friday.
Track temperatures reached around 60°C during FP2, and the team's early strategic modelling pointed strongly toward a two-stop race if conditions remain similar.
That changes the kind of performance McLaren needs. Norris does not necessarily have to beat Verstappen or Leclerc over one qualifying lap if the MCL40 can preserve its tires more effectively across long stints.
Equally, strong short-run pace means much less if the car begins giving away several tenths per lap once the tires overheat.
At 26%, Norris remains outside the leading three in the market, but Friday gave McLaren enough evidence to stay firmly in the fight.
Will tire degradation and Malaysia's weather turn this into a strategy race?
This may ultimately matter more than the small gaps between the leading cars.
Sepang's combination of high energy, abrasive asphalt and extreme heat produced heavy tire wear almost immediately. McLaren's analysis already leans toward a two-stop race under normal dry conditions, while the harder compounds could become particularly valuable if Sunday's track temperatures remain high.
The weather adds another layer. Saturday carries around a 40% chance of rain, while Sunday's forecast currently gives approximately a 30% chance, alongside high humidity and temperatures around 31°C. Sepang's tropical conditions can also change much faster than a simple percentage suggests.
A shower during qualifying could dramatically change the grid. Rain during the race could be even more disruptive because teams would need to balance deteriorating slick tires against the risk of stopping too early for intermediates.
A Safety Car at the wrong moment could then turn a conventional two-stop strategy into something completely different.
The dry race is already likely to reward teams that understand degradation better than their rivals. Add uncertain weather and the strategic range becomes much wider.
That helps explain why a market with Antonelli at 41%, Verstappen at 38% and Russell at 34% still leaves meaningful probability for Norris, Leclerc and the rest. There are simply more ways than usual for the fastest theoretical package not to control the race.
What could move F1 Bahrain Grand Prix in Malaysia odds before the race?
FP3 should provide the first major update.
Mercedes needs cleaner representative laps from both Antonelli and Russell, while Verstappen's first proper soft-tire run should reveal how much one-lap performance Red Bull kept hidden on Friday.
Ferrari will be trying to establish whether Leclerc's FP2 benchmark survives once the other leading cars complete cleaner qualifying simulations.
Qualifying may then have an unusually large effect on the market.
Sepang offers overtaking opportunities, so pole is not everything, but track position still reduces exposure to traffic and gives the leading cars more freedom over strategy.
Hadjar's five-place grid penalty also means his qualifying result will not translate directly into his starting position.
Tire behaviour is the second major variable. If FP3 confirms Friday's high degradation, teams with stronger long-run management should gain relative to cars built more heavily around qualifying performance.
A clearer indication that a two-stop race is unavoidable would also increase the value of pit-stop flexibility and fresh tire availability.
Then there is the weather. The current forecast keeps rain in play for both Saturday and Sunday, and a meaningful change in precipitation risk could reshape the market quickly.
By the time the grid is set, the 41%-38%-34% hierarchy could look very different.
Recent Malaysian Grand Prix winners
2017 — Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing
2016 — Daniel Ricciardo, Red Bull Racing
2015 — Sebastian Vettel, Ferrari
2014 — Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes
2013 — Sebastian Vettel, Red Bull Racing
2012 — Fernando Alonso, Ferrari
Verstappen won the most recent Formula 1 race at Sepang in 2017, passing Lewis Hamilton early and finishing more than 12 seconds clear.
Red Bull also scored a one-two here in 2016 with Ricciardo ahead of Verstappen, although those results come from a completely different technical era and should be treated as circuit context rather than direct evidence for 2026.
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