Formula 1 betting: Charles Leclerc and Max Verstappen are the Saudi Arabia favorites

There are two co-favorites for the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix. And neither of them is Lewis Hamilton.

Red Bull’s Max Verstappen and Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc enter the second race of the F1 season (1 p.m. ET, ESPN) at +140 each to win. Leclerc won the season-opening Bahrain Grand Prix ahead of teammate Carlos Sainz. Verstappen looked like he was heading for a second-place finish until he had an engine problem with a few laps to go.

Leclerc and Verstappen ran 1-2 for most of the opening race. Hamilton, meanwhile, was a solid fifth behind both Red Bull and both Ferrari drivers until the final laps. He finished third after Verstappen and teammate Sergio Perez both had problems.

Sainz is the No. 3 favorite to win in Saudi Arabia at +700 while Hamilton is the No. 4 favorite at +900. Yes, Lewis Hamilton is +900 to win the race a year after he was even odds to win some races as he battled Verstappen for the world title.

Hamilton is the defending champion of the Jeddah race after he beat Verstappen in an epic battle a season ago. Hamilton ran into the back of Verstappen’s car after Verstappen slowed on the straightaway in what he said was an effort to give Hamilton the spot on the track after Verstappen had gone off track earlier in the lap as the two were racing for position.

But with F1’s 2022 rules, Mercedes is still trying to get its car figured out. It seems to have some speed. But whenever the team tries to unleash that speed, the car porpoises on the straightaways. A week doesn’t seem like enough time for Mercedes to get the issue figured out, so Hamilton is the No. 4 favorite.

If you’re feeling daring, a bet on Hamilton has a chance to be profitable. Here are the plays we like ahead of this weekend’s race. All odds are from BetMGM. We need to bounce back after a bad week to start the season.

Any driver other than Verstappen to win FP1 (-250)

Sainz ended up as the FP1 winner in Bahrain by a comfortable margin as teams were working on myriad strategies. We think there will be a lot of strategy variance here too, and we’re covering for the possibility of a Mercedes bounce back here.

Qualifying margin to be 0.100 seconds or less (+150)

It could be an exceptionally tight qualifying session and even if Mercedes doesn’t gain some speed, there isn’t much separating Ferrari and Red Bull.

Pole winning car isn’t a Ferrari (-115)

You can get the same odds on either Leclerc or Sainz winning the pole. We’ll take our chances with the 18 other cars.

Max Verstappen to post the race’s fastest lap (+175)

The Red Bull cars appeared to have the best straight-line speed at Bahrain. That will play exceptionally well at a track that requires drivers to be flat out a lot.

Lewis Hamilton to finish in the top 3 (+220)

This was the only bet of ours that hit last week, so we’re trying it again this week. If some craziness happens again, Mercedes could be in a position to capitalize if it doesn’t have the outright speed.