A massive rainy track, cold and unfriendly weather greeted the field in Melbourne , where the question of the day was whether McLaren and Lando Norris could turn their excellent one-lap pace into victory .
The Australian Grand Prix field had just started the lead-up lap when Isaac Hadja r , the Racing Bulls rookie, lost his car in a slow corner and crashed into the wall... After a lead-up like that, we could have expected a real chaos in the season opener. He did.
After the start, Max Verstappen immediately improved a position, while Lando Norris retained his lead, but we didn't see much continuity because Jack Doohan badly crashed his Alpine further back . The safety car could have come out, but no sooner had they signaled this than we saw another car crash into the wall: Carlos Sainz threw the Williams...
A merciless and boring 30 minutes followed, during which rescues were carried out, and this time was more than enough for the aforementioned circumstances to change. In the meantime, after eight laps behind the safety car, the race finally started again, but nothing worthwhile happened, unless we can consider it the drying of the ideal curve. Norris increasingly pulled away from Verstappen , who was constantly being approached by Piastri . The Australian soon scouted his opponent, but the truth is that this was more due to the Dutchman's snagging. There were many mistakes and very few changes of place, and moments reminiscent of racing. The position at the front was unchanged, Norris led, Piastri followed him, and Verstappen was crawling behind them with a gap . The rest of the field could not even get a cut, and this says a lot about the balance of power. We were about to give up the race when Fernando Alonso had a second thought and slammed the Aston Martin into the wall, causing the boys to scramble. Many switched to hard, others to medium, and this fundamentally upset the strategy that had been built up so well.
After a long lap and clearing up the wreckage, the next start could come, where the two McLarens easily kept the first two places ahead of Verstappen , but... But the rain came and with it the madness: Piastri slid out and buried himself, Norris fled for intermediate tires, while Verstappen took the lead . But the Dutchman did not control the situation for long either, it ended in a pit lane . Meanwhile, Lewis Hamilton took the lead (!!), Liam Lawson and Gabriel Bortoleto hit the wall.
Finally, Lando Norris made the restart perfect , dominating the entire race and easily winning the Australian Grand Prix ahead of Max Verstappen and George Russell. We must not forget the amazing fourth place of Alexander Albon and the Williams, Andrea Kimi Antonelli in fifth, and the fact that what started as a boring race turned into a great race and a real fight in the final laps !
Photo: AP
