The first race of the season is here and as per usual it started bright and early (well, dark and early for anyone in Europe – 4 am is a brutal time). The hype seemed even bigger for this year’s opener in Melbourne as anything seems possible with the new regulations. Testing is always a tricky way to fully gauge the cars as an outsider, but many eagle-eyed “experts” have been under the impression that Mercedes will be extremely quick. Today’s race has held all the answers we’ve been (not so) patiently waiting for.
The start of the race and the first ten laps made every fans heart beat exhilarate as Charles Leclerc and George Russell battled it out for the front-runners position, switching back and forth between themselves multiple times. The Ferrari had an incredible start and what backed that up was that it was not only Leclerc who managed to jump positions from the get-go, but Lewis Hamilton too.
Ultimately they had to give up positions to Kimi Antonelli in the other Mercedes, due to poor strategy from the team. The Tifosi are once again back in their vicious cycle of believing their car can actually win a championship, if the correct calls could be made.
The race also saw many retirements, the saddest one being home-hero Oscar Piastri. He crashed on his way to the grid and could not even start the Grand Prix. The Australian Curse is well and truly alive still.
Rookie Arvin Lindblad did phenomenal well in the VISA CashApp Racing Bull for his debut race and Max Verstappen, after a horrible qualifying, was happy to make it into the points.
George Russel now leads the Championship standings and is the first Mercedes driver top do so since Lewis Hamilton in 2021. Team principle Toto Wolff was seeing smirking after qualifying which has lead fans to believe that the Mercedes will only continue to rocket off in the front for the foreseeable next races.
We will see you next week in China for the first sprint race of the season!
