After a brief break, Formula One was back in action this weekend with the FORMULA 1 ROLEX AUSTRALIAN GRAND PRIX 2024 around Albert Park, with fans around the world tuning into the race in the early morning hours. The race was anything but routine, with a dramatic early race retirement blowing the race wide open.
Max Verstappen got away well from pole position, immediately moving to cover off Carlos Sainz, who is back in action this weekend and a little lighter after his appendix surgery two weeks ago. Sainz, in turn, managed to cover off any challenge from Lando Norris into the first corner.
Further back, Sergio Perez, who started the race from P6 due to a three-place grid penalty for impeding Nico Hulkenberg during qualifying, managed to keep his position in the first corner. But George Russell couldn’t get his Mercedes around the Red Bull in the fourth corner.
Back at the front, Max Verstappen failed to cruise beyond DRS range by the end of the first lap for the first time this season, leaving him vulnerable to attack from Sainz behind. A small mistake by Verstappen into turn six compromised his run down the long sweeping corners that followed. With DRS, Sainz put his car around the outside of Verstappen’s Red Bull before the quick turn nine. Verstappen immediately began to complain about the car being too loose.
The potential reason behind this complaint emerged just four laps into the race, as smoke began pouring from the rear of Verstappen’s Red Bull car. The reigning World Champion limped back to the pit lane, shedding debris in the penultimate corner. He came to a stop in his pit box with the right-rear brake on fire. For the first time in 43 races, he climbed from the car to retire, blowing the race wide open.
Lewis Hamilton was the next driver to retire from the race after the first round of pit stops. The engine of his Mercedes packed up in the fast back sector of the circuit. He crawled around to an access point in the wall just after turn ten. This allowed the marshals to clear the stricken car quickly, but not without deploying the virtual safety car. This allowed drivers who had not yet pitted to make a cheap pit stop.
Nico Hulkenberg was one of the drivers able to do this, bringing him into contention for some points. Fernando Alonso was another driver to take advantage of the VSC, finding himself in P5.
When the race resumed, Sergio Perez began his push towards the front of the field. With his teammate out of the race, he was Red Bull’s only chance of scoring points this weekend. After a few laps, he overtook Russell around the outside of turn nine, reclaiming the P6 he lost on the opening lap of the race. He overtook Alonso to move up to the top five a few laps later but struggled to pull away from the Aston Martin.
Further ahead, McLaren didn’t win any love from the Aussie fans when the team ordered a swap that put Lando Norris ahead of home driver Oscar Piastri. Norris was on five laps fresher tyres, having pitted on lap 15.
After a handful of laps, Charles Leclerc had to cover off the undercut threat from Norris behind, making his second pit stop of the race on lap 35. The Ferrari rejoined the race, narrowly ahead of Perez and Alonso, having to defend hard on cold tyres in the first sector. This put Perez under pressure from the Aston Martin behind, but he couldn’t get by. He pitted the following lap.
With two top regular point scorers out of the race, there were a couple of extra points-scoring positions up for grabs, making for some tough racing in the midfield, particularly between Haas and Williams. Kevin Magnussen, who was heavily criticized for his driving standards when battling in Saudi Arabia, and Alex Albon, who was in the sole Williams after a heavy crash in practice forced him to take over Logan Sargeant’s car, battled hard for P11. In the end, Magnussen came out on top, although only his teammate would score a point… or so it seemed.
In the closing stages, Russell was looking to improve his position to P6 by overtaking Alonso. He was all over the back of the Aston Martin but lost control of the car under braking in turn six on the penultimate lap. The Mercedes slammed into the barriers and came to rest in the middle of the circuit. The virtual safety car was deployed for the final lap of the race.
This allowed Carlos Sainz, the man set to become a free agent at the end of the year, to complete his final lap of the race to take his first victory of 2024. Charles Leclerc came home in second place to help Ferrari earn their first 1-2 finish since the Bahrain Grand Prix in 2022. Lando Norris stood on the bottom step of the podium.
Next up is the Japanese Grand Prix in two weeks, in its new spring time slot. The race will be held on April 7.
UPDATE: After the race, Fernando Alonso was handed a drive-through penalty for “potentially dangerous driving,” claiming he made “an unusual manoeuvre” into turn six causing George Russell’s crash. Since the race was over, his drive-through penalty was converted into a 20-second time penalty. This dropped him from P6 to P8, promoting Lance Stroll and Yuki Tsunoda. Critically, this returns Alonso to behind Russell in the championship standings and Aston Martin back to behind Mercedes.
| Pos. | Driver | Laps | Time | Points | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 58 | 1:20:26.843 | 25 | ||
| 2 | 58 | +2.366 | 19 |  | |
| 3 | 58 | +5.904 | 15 | ||
| 4 | 58 | +35.770 | 12 | ||
| 5 | 58 | +56.309 | 10 | ||
| 6 | 58 | +93.222 | 8 | ||
| 7 | 58 | +95.601 | 6 | ||
| 8 | 58 | +100.992 | 4 | ||
| 9 | 58 | +104.553 | 2 | ||
| 10 | 57 | +1 Lap | 1 | ||
| 11 | 57 | +1 Lap | |||
| 12 | 57 | +1 Lap | |||
| 13 | 57 | +1 Lap | |||
| 14 | 57 | +1 Lap | |||
| 15 | 57 | +1 Lap | |||
| 16 | 57 | +1 Lap | |||
| DNF | 56 | ||||
| DNF | 15 | ||||
| DNF | 3 |
