Battle of the 24-year-olds ticks a box for F1's new era

After last year's battle of the generations, and young pretender Max Verstappen taking the title from seven times world champion Lewis Hamilton, Formula One's new era has fired up a clash of 24-year-olds.

The season's first two floodlit races in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia have seen Ferrari's Charles Leclerc and Red Bull's Verstappen -- both 24 -- go wheel-to-wheel with one victory apiece.

The pair, established stars of the youth wave coming through who were just kids when Mercedes' Hamilton made his F1 debut in 2007, have been rivals since their formative years in go-karts.

"They were fighting when they were kids and now here for the first position in F1. It's very good for F1, a fantastic start to the season," enthused Ferrari team principal Mattia Binotto on Sunday night.

Leclerc leads the standings, ahead of 27-year-old team mate Carlos Sainz, with Verstappen third and George Russell, another 24-year-old, fourth for Mercedes. Hamilton, 37, is fifth.

The sport has undergone a rules revolution, in the hope of making racing closer and more exciting, and Red Bull boss Christian Horner said the evidence was there to see.

"In the last two races we've seen Charles and Max pass each other about 10 times, which we haven't seen in previous seasons, and it's been great racing," he said.

"Of a sample of two, you'd have to say it's a big tick in the box for the ability to follow closely and race wheel to wheel. It's been outstanding."

The next round is Australia on April 10 before Formula One returns to Europe and a home race for Ferrari at Italy's Imola.

"It's now going to be about development, about unlocking potential with these cars that are still very immature," said Horner.

"We can see Ferrari are very, very quick and it's going to be a busy period through the rest of the spring now to try and get performance to the cars, understand how the tyres are working and so on over these next few races."