Formula 1 Australian Grand Prix race

The Mexican has taken advantage of the Safety Car to stop twice. He put the medium first and went back to the hard later. He won’t have to stop again.

Verstappen’s steamroller mode begins. Quick lap and the DRS is already allowed.

More than a second difference between Versappen and Sainz. Spanish will not have DRS.

positions are maintained. Russell accelerated very early and no one could try to attack.

2 laps the Safety Car has lasted.

Several drivers have taken advantage of the safety car. Among them, Ocon or Pérez.

The Ferrari driver rushed through turn three very well to overtake Fernando Alonso.

Bad start to the career for the Dutchman. Both Mercedes have passed him and now he will have to put himself in attack mode.

1 Russell

2 Hamilton

3 Verstappens

4 Sainz

5 Alonso

The safety car appears so that they can remove the car of Charles Leclerc, who is signing a start to the season to forget.

Stroll has touched the Monegasque and the Ferrari driver has remained in the gravel of turn 3.

The Briton overtakes Verstappen.

The first eight on the grid have chosen the medium tyre. Opposite strategy for the Alpine, who wear soft, and Sergio Pérez, who rides the hard starting.

Less than ten minutes to the green light. Who is your favorite to win the Australian GP?

With 10 minutes to go before the start of the race, it’s time for the Australian anthem and a peculiar performance by some men painted white.

It seems impossible to repeat it, but the winner last season in Australia was Charles Leclerc. The Ferrari driver took advantage of Max Verstappen’s reliability abandonment and added what was his second victory of the season.

The strategy envisioned by most teams is one stop. The hard tire does not degrade practically anything, so mounting it ensures you reach the end of the race. Of course, both the soft and the medium are also options that degrade little if the tires are taken care of, although the teams have not been able to do many long runs to verify this.

After qualifying with cold conditions and the threat of rain, which came before the session, nothing to do with the race. The temperature today is much higher and no showers are expected, so the teams will be able to use their dry strategy.

We remind you of the starting grid for today. The last two, Valtteri Bottas and Sergio Pérez, will start from the pit lane:

Unusual movement from Madrid. After going out to reconnoiter the track, he went back into the garage, a very unusual manoeuvre. They can’t modify anything on the car beyond some adjustment of the wing, but it seems something programmed since he is back on the track.

Red Bull has very well identified its biggest rival: Fernando Alonso. They are so afraid of the Asturian and his chances of attacking Verstappen during the race, that Helmut Marko assured that he hopes that his staunch rivals, Mercedes, can serve as allies and make a stopper at the start of the race at ’14’.

Sergio Pérez had a disastrous Saturday, but it wasn’t much better for the Frenchman from Alpine. Ocon was eliminated in Q2, passed by his teammate Pierre Gasly and starting 12th today.

Ocon lamented on the radio of his elimination, suffering from the traffic that prevented him from scheduling a lap.

Although the Mexican was very clear from the start about the problem that led him to gravel and the last position in Q1, for Helmut Marko, Red Bull adviser, it is not so clear.

Or it is clear, but it does not agree with the Mexican. Marko believes that the failure was the fault of Sergio Pérez himself.

The Mexican ended up very upset after making a mistake in Q1 that left him stuck in the gravel and forced him to start last in the race (finally he will do so from pit lane).

The sample of Pérez’s anger with his team came from radiostating that the error was due to a mechanical failure that he already had in free practice and the team did not know how to solve.

In addition to the performance problems of the Italian single-seater, the first confrontation between its pilots has been added. Charles Leclerc finished seventh in the classification, but complained on the radio and later with the press that Carlos Sainz bothered him on his return.

In the press area he commented on it to the man from Madrid and they started arguing in front of everyone and, although everything remained in a calm conversation, the tension in Ferrari begins to grow.

Ferrari seems the fourth team in contention. From the Scudería they have affirmed that in Australia, unlike the first two races, they are better in race pace than in qualifying due to “important changes in the car”.

The reality is that Leclerc will start seventh and Carlos Sainz fifth. The man from Madrid will try to storm the podium after his scare in qualifying, in which almost hit someone.

With Pérez out and a much superior Verstappen, Fernando Alonso’s rivals for the podium are the Mercedes, who come out ahead. The German team has been lamenting the design of its car throughout the start of the season and affirming that they would change it, but in Albert Park, without changes, they have been very fast.

Hence, Fernando Alonso sent them a message about that negative speech.

The Asturian dared to bring the word to the fore for the first time championship. Alonso did it after finishing the ‘qualification’ thinking of scoring points for Pérez to reduce the difference with the Red Bull driver.

The Spaniard did not get second place in Jeddah due to the surprising appearance of the Mercedes, but he was very happy with the result. Despite starting fourth, he stated that it was the best of the three time trials “in terms of benefits”.

The Dutchman, just like he did in Bahrain, has proven to be the strongest driver on the grid and took pole position. He is the top favorite for victory, but he will have to defend his first position from the ambitious Mercedes, who escort him in the starting positions.

The novelty of the race is that Red Bull has decided to take advantage of Sergio Pérez’s poor classification to sanction. They have assembled their third battery and motor unit, as well as changes to the suspensions to fix what happened in the ‘qualy’. Bottas will also start from the pit lane for making changes in the Parc Fermé period.

Good morning early risers and welcome to this minute by minute in which we will tell everything that happens in the Australian Grand Prix race in which Max Verstappen starts on pole, Fernando Alonso fourth and Carlos Sainz fifth.

you can consult here the schedule and where to watch the race.