After months of waiting, the 2016 season is fully underway! Testing couldn’t really show us much, in terms of what car has the greater chance of taking the championship victory: Mercedes or Ferrari. All eyes will be on these two teams, as each team looks to put on a strong showing to start this season.
For this opening round of the season, teams arrived at the Melbourne Grand Prix Circuit in Australia. This is a street circuit surrounding the Albert Park Lake and it hosted its Grand Prix in 1953, although it was ran in the opposite direction at that time. This circuit differs greatly from the other street circuits on the calendar because it is fast and has some large runoff areas, which we usually don’t see on a street circuit. This is one of the few tracks on the calendar that still has gravel traps. There are several high-speed sections on the circuit, including corners, and there are not really any sharp turns, except for the penultimate corner. The racing surface is surprisingly smooth, considering that it is a public road when it’s not a race track. Although the circuit is very different from the common street circuit, it still has a few street circuit qualities: unforgiving walls located close to the racing surface.
Last season, Mercedes were able to show that they hadn’t lost their ability to dominate during the winter break, by locking out the first two steps of the podium and the front row of the grid. They will be looking to continue this record for 2016, but will have a new challenger: Ferrari. Lewis Hamilton will try to finish ahead of his teammate, Nico Rosberg, but they will have to keep in mind just how close Ferrari are. But what team will take the early championship lead?
It would appear that Mercedes still has the advantage going into 2016. Of course, the first two sessions of the weekend are useless, due to the conditions. Free practice three and qualifying are the sessions that really give us the insight about who has the pace. Hamilton has been the fastest in every session this weekend, even the ones that had the poor weather, so he should have no problem taking the win in the race. Rosberg was right behind his teammate in both of the dry sessions, but Sebastian Vettel will be hungry for victory and might just get the better of Rosberg in this race.
The hype about Ferrari’s great pace really hasn’t added up to much this far in the competition. Vettel is still trailing behind the two Mercedes, with Kimi Räikkönen behind his teammate. Rosberg will have the advantage over Vettel at the start because the Mercedes driver will have the inside line into turn one, but look for Vettel to use some pit strategy during the race to overtake Rosberg. As for Räikkönen, I’m not sure that he can hold onto fourth position.
Something that’s really surprising so far in the season is how much Toro Rosso seems to have improved. Their lap times have been really good and they even managed to outpace the Williams team. Max Verstappen will start behind Räikkönen, but although the Ferrari has the pace over the Toro Rosso, Verstappen has made some great moves and magical things behind the wheel of the car last season. He is more willing to make an overtake than Räikkönen is, so Verstappen will probably get past the Finn.
It will be interesting to see who comes out on top in this race, as it will set the tone for the entire season. However, whoever wins must remember that a lot of things can happen throughout the season and it will be important for them to remain focused so that their rival does sneak past. It will be great to see the Haas F1 Team make their debut, despite their poor performance. But they’ve worked hard, as is the case with every team on the grid. Let’s buckle up and prepare, as the 2016 Formula One season is about to get underway.
