Bahrain Grand Prix: High five for Rosberg

Nico Rosberg powered to his fifth consecutive Formula 1 victory, two out of two so far this year, when he cruised to a comprehensive victory in the Bahrain Grand Prix while his main title rivals tripped over themselves.

As he did in the season opener, Rosberg made a good start relative to pole sitter and teammate Lewis Hamilton. The German making a clean getaway, unchallenged into and out of Turn 1 he took the lead and was never again headed during the course of the evening.

Thereafter Rosberg was always in control of proceedings, establishing a handy gap which varied little throughout the race. Perhaps the only glitch in an otherwise flawless performance was a tardy pitstop which cost him a couple of seconds.

But in the end no drama for him as he stretched his lead over Hamilton at the top of the standings to 17 points after two races.

The win was the 16th of the German's career, lifting him level in the all-time lists with British great Stirling Moss, and the eighth in a row for champions Mercedes.

Rosberg said on the podium, "For sure, it's been an awesome weekend. The key was the start. i had a great getaway and from there I was just trying to control the race."

It was a bittersweet night for Ferrari, from who much was expected in Bahrain. Sebastian Vettel's race ended before it even started, as his car sighed a huge puff of smoke midway through the formation lap forcing its driver to park up between Turn 13 and Turn 14.

The onus thus fell on Kimi Raikkonen in the sister car to salvaged a result for the Reds. The Finn botched his start, was mugged in the drag race to Turn 1 and slipped down the order early on. But credit to him as he proceeded to fight back and muscle his way up to second place by mid-race where he remained until the end.

As per his trademark the Iceman appeared on the podium as if he was attending his best friends funeral, struggling to crack a smile while looking as if he was about to burst into tears and mumbling these pearls of wisdom: "I had a bad start. We did what we could and tried to recover and had a pretty good result."

Beaten off the line by his teammate, Hamilton was swamped from the back and got clattered into by the Williams of Valtteri Bottas as they tussled for the same piece of tarmac in Turn 1, bits and pieces flew off the Silver Arrows as it got gobbled up by the pack.

By the time the dust had settled - and there was plenty of it as a number of cars made contact - the world champion was in eighth and the race for him would be all about damage limitation. And this he did by picking his way back up to third place by the time the chequered flag waved.

Hamilton said afterwards, "Again, damage limitation. Congratulations to Nico. The team was hoping that potentially there would be a safety car. I had so much damage to the car, I couldn't fight with Kimi."

All but the top six cars were lapped, with 17 finishers.

Red Bull's Australian Daniel Ricciardo was fourth for the second race running, with Frenchman Romain Grosjean performing more heroics for the new Haas team by finishing fifth after sixth in Australia.

Dutch teenager Max Verstappen finished sixth for Toro Rosso, with Russian Daniil Kvyat seventh for sister team Red Bull and Felipe Massa eighth for Williams ahead of Bottas.

Belgian rookie Stoffel Vandoorne, standing in for Fernando Alonso at McLaren after the Spaniard was ruled out on medical grounds after his big crash in Melbourne, scored on his debut with 10th place.

The points were McLaren's first of the season and capped a great weekend for the reigning GP2 champion, who also out-qualified 2009 world champion team mate Jenson Button. The Briton retired on lap seven.

With Vettel and Alonso not starting, that left three of the sport's five active world champions watching from the sidelines.

Manor rookie Rio Haryanto became the first Indonesian to finish a Formula 1 race, in 17th and last place.

Although there were several memorable duels throughout the field - during the course of the evening at the pristine floodlit venue albeit alarmingly devoid of spectators - the 2016 edition of the Bahrain Grand Prix will go down as a pretty mundane affair not helped by Vettel's no show and the early assault on Hamilton.