The Australian Grand Prix became a race of attrition as the Formula One drivers navigated the slick roads of Albert Park Grand Prix Circuit. Six competitors crashed out by the time the checkered flag fell.
Rain soaked the track in the hours leading up to the race, making the painted lines slippery. The first to hit the barriers was Isack Hadjar on the formation lap as he tried to light up his tires. Next was Jack Doohan on the opening lap, followed by Carlos Sainz several turns later (though the Williams driver reported he had a “massive torque delivery”). Fernando Alonso wrecked on Lap 32 while rookies Liam Lawson and Gabriel Bortoleto crashed separately 13 and 14 laps later.
Lando Norris survived to win the season’s first race, with Max Verstappen finishing 0.895 seconds behind the McLaren driver. And after the offseason hype surrounding Ferrari, it wasn’t Charles Leclerc or Lewis Hamilton standing on the podium. It was Mercedes’ George Russell, who said he was in “no man’s land.”
There is one storyline that may fly under the radar given the messy nature of F1’s opener — Kimi Antonelli’s calm drive from P16 to P4. The performance was not perfect, but it put Mercedes equal with McLaren in the constructors’ standings. The 18-year-old, tasked with filling the shoes vacated by seven-time world champion Hamilton, is now the second-youngest points scorer in F1 history.
“We always knew the potential,” Mercedes’ team boss Toto Wolff said. “We followed him since he was a kid, and he performs under pressure. On Saturday in qualifying, that wasn’t his doing. He just kicked the pump at the wrong place, and he would have qualified much further ahead. On Sunday, you saw that, he properly wheeled everybody in, slowly but surely, without making any mistakes.”
The rookies’ first race of the season was never going to be easy.
Not only are they adjusting to a new team and a new car, but the conditions were a roller coaster: Friday was warm, Saturday was hot. And come Sunday, the weather was rainy and cold, which is difficult enough for a seasoned driver to navigate. Pierre Gasly, when talking about teammate Doohan, said, “It was probably throwing him in the deep end with this sort of conditions,” calling it “probably the toughest conditions here.”
“Respect to all the rookies,” Sauber’s Nico Hülkenberg said to F1 TV. “This as your first race is quite a tough one. I wouldn’t have wanted a race like this as my first so they’ve all done really well, regardless of how it went.”
Rain always introduces more uncertainties depending on how the conditions evolve. As cliché as it may sound, anything can happen. Case in point: Verstappen’s standout drive in Brazil last year from P17 to victory.
Antonelli entered the Australian GP on the back foot, with his qualifying debut disrupted after suffering bib damage that cost him performance. He was only 0.09 seconds off a Q2 spot, knocked out by Bortoleto, and lined up for Sunday’s race P16 — 12 spots behind teammate Russell.
The Mercedes driver drove a largely faultless race. He executed notable overtakes, such as passing Hülkenberg — though Antonelli did spin, which led to the more experienced Sauber driver passing him and Antonelli overtaking again. As Wolff noted to Sky Sports, the young driver “took it the right way, wheeled it in one by one, showed the pace when he had no traffic.”
“On Sunday we got all the possible worst conditions for a first race,” Antonelli said. “We got wet, slicks on damp, slicks on wet, and then back to wet. So an eventful race but I’m really happy how it was managed from my side and from the team.
“I did a couple of mistakes, especially the spin, but the conditions were super, super tricky. Also, those white lines were a killer.”
But Wolff seemed unsurprised by Antonelli’s impressive drive, even though it was only his second time driving an F1 car in these conditions. The other was his maiden F1 test in Austria.
“Even very good drivers spun or hit the wall and it was easier to not finish than finish and he kept his cool,” he said to Sky Sports. “It was very impressive and it shows he has a good future as long as the trajectory keeps being where it is.”
Kimi Antonelli finished better than Lewis Hamilton on Sunday (Sipa USA)
While Antonelli’s drive deserves praise, the Italian credited the team for the strategy and how they “helped me throughout the whole race.” It was race engineer Peter Bonnington’s first time guiding Antonelli in a race after years of working with Hamilton.
This performance comes at a pivotal time for Mercedes. It has experienced inconsistent performance in recent seasons, and this year marks the first in 12 years that Hamilton is not competing for the Silver Arrows. Securing third- and fourth-place finishes is huge, putting Mercedes at the same level as McLaren, atop the constructors’ standings. It’s Mercedes’ best points haul in a season opener since 2022.
“It was pretty clear from the beginning that these guys were too quick for us, and we were quicker than Ferrari,” Russell said about the key to securing a podium finish. “So, I was kind of in no man’s land. I decided quite early on that the best way to approach this race was to bring it home. If I risked it more, there was no extra reward because they were just so far ahead. Very difficult. As Lando said, any small mistake and you’d be punished. But pleased to come home with this result because I don’t think this is probably our strongest circuit.”
The key moment was pitting on the proper lap, a call Russell made “five seconds in advance.” Wolff told Sky Sports, “There’s so much talk about Kimi and he merits it, but George is so good. He extracts from the car more than the car has at times, he makes no mistakes, he’s a true leader in the team and we’re lucky to have him.”
But Russell did concede that Australia wasn’t the Silver Arrows’ strongest weekend, despite the finishing positions. McLaren’s pace is another level, and the Woking-based team is clearly ahead of the other top four teams. While Ferrari’s pace was off in Australia, it is expected to be in the same ballpark as Mercedes. Regarding tire management, Wolff felt the pecking order was McLaren, Red Bull and then Mercedes.
“It would’ve been fourth and fifth on merit. We are where we are, and that’s why you can never take your foot off the throttle. We have to analyze, what is it we can do to manage the tire better?” Wolff said. “We’re not missing 20 points in downforce. That’s not the thing. It’s just literally on the mechanical side, what can we do to keep these in the sweet spot?”
Wolff feels Mercedes’ car has “become more predictable.” It is balanced, which contrasts previous editions, and the team has capable drivers — Russell made a strong strategy call and Antonelli made a near-faultless debut.
But Mercedes still needs to understand the long-run performance better, and soon. It may be the final year of the regulations, but the Silver Arrows are not changing how they prioritize preparing for next season compared to this year. Wolff said, “You have to keep your cool and continue your trajectory.”
“It’s a solid first weekend. But looking at it always from the glass half-empty side, you have to say that the pace of the McLaren is just very strong. We need to understand the way they manage the tires and extract performance. We need to be better.
“If we want to fight on merit for race victories and for a championship, then there’s something we need to fight.”
Additional reporting by Luke Smith.
(Top photo: Sipa USA)
