Jenson Button stormed to victory in the first Grand Prix of the 2012 Formula 1 season. Button, the 2009 World Champion, rarely looked troubled after he leapfrogged his teammate Lewis Hamilton off the start line with his only cause for concern coming when his lead was wiped out during a Safety Car period. Sebastian Vettel drove a confident if slightly lucky race to finish in 2nd while Hamilton looked dejected despite taking the final podium spot. Mark Webber pushed Hamilton close but just couldn’t overhaul the McLaren while Alonso took fifth, limiting the damage to Ferrari’s reputation.
Jenson Button beams after taking top spot Down Under
The race itself was a typically thrilling Australian Grand Prix with the lack of in-season developments and the new regulations left the field closely bunched up and battles waged throughout the grid. As the two McLarens pulled away at the front, Vettel brilliantly sliced his way around the outside of Nico Rosberg’s Mercedes into the Clark chicane. Romain Grosjean failed to translate a strong qualifying into a decent race performance after he crashed out following contact with the Williams of Pastor Maldonado. Raikkonen in the other Lotus began to make his way through the pack along with Sergio Perez who quickly made amends for his 5 place grid penalty for a gearbox change. Felipe Massa continued to struggle in the Ferrari but Fernando Alonso finally looked to have got to grips with his troublesome challenger, suggesting that the car runs better on heavier fuel.
Michael Schumacher’s day started brightly after he moved up into 3rd off the start but a loss of hydraulics soon brought about a premature end to the German’s afternoon. Rosberg struggled with tyre degradation and an overall lack of pace and finished down in 12th after contact with Perez on the final lap. Button continued to lead as Vettel closed down Hamilton after the first stops but the Caterham of Vitaly Petrov brought out the Safety Car when his car ground to a halt down the pit straight, leaving the marshalls unable to safely remove it. McLaren had brought in Button and Hamilton the lap before, working beautifully to avoid them queuing but all that hard work was about to be undone. When the Safety Car is deployed, the driver has to drive to a target time or ‘delta’ to ensure that he isn’t speeding under the Safety Car conditions and when Hamilton exited the pits he had to cruise around the circuit to make sure he did not exceed the delta time. Vettel meanwhile could go faster knowing that he would be pitting the next lap and his time in the pits would ensure he would not exceed the delta time. Sure enough, when Vettel rejoined he was ahead of Hamilton to the delight of his Red Bull mechanics.
They ran 1-2 in the early stages, but Hamilton was left lamenting a lost chance to claim a precious win as Button cruised to victory
Webber was also able to get the jump over Alonso thanks to the Safety Car and it was now a straight fight between the McLarens and the Red Bulls. Further back Perez was making use of his one stop strategy, the Toro Rosso’s were proving that their strong showing in testing was not just a flash in the pan and Pastor Maldonado was hounding Alonso for fifth. Hamilton struggled for pace from the restart and was gradually dropped by Vettel while Button was able to manage the gap back to 2nd place. Massa’s afternoon came to an unsavoury end when he tangled with Bruno Senna which retired both the Williams and the Ferrari. Heikki Kovalainen retired the second Caterham with a steering issue and was handed a five place grid penalty for Malaysia after he overtook two cars before the Safety Car line when he pitted while the Safety Car was out on track.
That was how it was set to finish until the final chaotic lap which saw a number of incidents and changes in position. Firstly Pastor Maldonado, who massively impressed me despite my accusation that he didn’t merit being in the race seat, threw away his chance of a big points haul when he clipped the astro turf coming out of the Lauda corner and without the aid of a blown diffuser, was catapulted into the concrete wall. Behind him, Perez was nursing badly worn tyres when Rosberg tried to lunge round the outside of turn 10; they touched and Rosberg was forced to limp home, being passed by all those around him. That allowed Kobayashi and Raikkonen through into 6th and 7th while Perez had to handle the two Toro Rosso’s and Paul di Resta’s Force India. Out of the final corner, di Resta powered past Jean-Eric Vergne to score a 10th place that had looked unlikely just a few corners before. Ricciardo took 9th and his first ever points finish while Perez held on to eighth from 22nd on the grid with a superb one stop. At the front of the field, one man was in a class of his own and for once he wasn’t driving a Red Bull as Button took the chequered flag – the 2012 season looks set to be a cracker!
Provisional Classification:
- 1. Jenson Button (Vodafone McLaren Mercedes) 1hr34:09.565
- 2. Sebastian Vettel (Red Bull Racing) + 2.139
- 3. Lewis Hamilton (Vodafone McLaren Mercedes) + 4.075
- 4. Mark Webber (Red Bull Racing) + 4.547
- 5. Fernando Alonso (Scuderia Ferrari) + 21.565
- 6. Kamui Kobayashi (Sauber F1) + 36.766
- 7. Kimi Raikkonen (Lotus F1) + 38.014
- 8. Sergio Perez (Sauber F1) + 39.458
- 9. Daniel Ricciardo (Scuderia Toro Rosso) + 39.556
- 10. Paul di Resta (Sahara Force India) + 39.737
- 11. Jean-Eric Vergne (Scuderia Toro Rosso) + 39.848
- 12. Nico Rosberg (Mercedes AMG Petronas) + 57.642
- 13. Pastor Maldonado (Williams F1) + 1 Lap
- 14. Timo Glock (Marussia F1) + 1 Lap
- 15. Charles Pic (Marussia F1) + 5 Laps
Not Classified:
- Bruno Senna (Williams F1) – Damage, Lap 54
- Felipe Massa (Scuderia Ferrari) – Collision, Lap 47
- Heikki Kovalainen (Caterham F1) – Steering, Lap 42
- Vitaly Petrov (Caterham F1) – Hydraulics, Lap 37
- Michael Schumacher (Mercedes AMG Petronas) – Hydraulics, Lap 11
- Romain Grosjean (Lotus F1) – Damage, Lap 2
- Nico Hulkenberg (Sahara Force India) – Damage, Lap 1
- Pedro de la Rosa (HRT F1) – Did Not Start
- Nahrain Karthikeyan (HRT F1) – Did Not Start
Drivers’ Championship Standings:
- Jenson Button – 25 Points
- Sebastian Vettel – 18 Points
- Lewis Hamilton – 15 Points
- Mark Webber – 12 Points
- Fernando Alonso – 10 Points
- Kamui Kobayashi – 8 Points
- Kimi Raikkonen – 6 Points
- Sergio Perez – 4 Points
- Daniel Ricciardo – 2 Points
- Paul di Resta – 1 Point
Constructors Championship Standings:
- Vodafone McLaren Mercedes – 40 Points
- Red Bull Racing – 30 Points
- Sauber F1 – 12 Points
- Scuderia Ferrari – 10 Points
- Lotus F1 – 6 Points
- Scuderia Toro Rosso – 2 Points
- Sahara Force India – 1 Point
Analysis and Comment
What can we learn from the opening round of the season? Well, Red Bull have seemingly gone the opposite way in performance to last season with a much stronger race showing than in qualifying. Vettel wasn’t able to simply pull out a gap in the early stages and maintain it throughout the race but that meant that we finally got to see the true racer underneath that helmet as his sensational move on Rosberg demonstrated. Webber seems more at ease with the tyres and the car this season too and we should expect to see some stronger performances from the Australian this year. The RB8 still wasn’t looking as good as its predecessor as Vettel still ended up sliding across the run-off area on the outside of turn 1 when he was chasing Schumacher. Clearly the rear of the car is still not quite in the right area as the team seek to make up for the lost performance that the lack of a blown diffuser brings. Both drivers will have to adapt their driving style to the new regulations as I got the impression that Vettel was flinging the car in expecting the diffuser to still be aiding him when it just won’t anymore. I’m sure Mr Newey and co. will have a raft of upgrades prepared to remedy the issue but how badly will it hurt their performance over the first few flyaway races?
Sebastian Vettel has got to be satisfied with finishing 2nd after a poor qualifying session on Saturday
The McLaren MP4-27 is by far the best looking car on the grid but it also appears to be the fastest at this stage. It is very well balanced on both high and low fuel, has superb traction and most importantly a high level of downforce combined with decent straight line speed. The car seems to suit Jenson’s driving style much more than Lewis’ and I don’t think it is as twitchy as Lewis would like it to be under race conditions which is probably why he wasn’t able to match Jenson today. It is also very kind on its tyres, beaten only by the RB8 in that respect, but crucially it does warm up the Pirellis a lot faster than the Red Bull does which is something that has cost McLaren in the past couple of seasons. We all know that McLaren are the kings of in-season development but for once they are at the head of the field at the beginning of the season. Hopefully they can at least match and even exceed the rate of development at Red Bull to give us a truly thrilling title fight that goes down to the wire. With Jenson looking so smooth and in control today, Lewis will have to up his game at Malaysia this weekend before the tabloid press starts asking questions.
Sauber were the pick of the midfield after round one and sit a rather unexpected 3rd in the Constructors Championship
Sauber were by far the biggest surprise of the weekend. Starting in 13th and 22nd, few would have predicted a double points finish for the Swiss outfit but Kobayashi and Perez are a young and exciting duo who never give in. Perez again showed his prowess on the Pirelli tyres by completing a one stop strategy while Kobayashi showed Kimi Raikkonen some of the explosive overtaking that the Finn has missed from Kobayashi since he left the sport. The car never really looked in too much trouble and despite Perez having a damaged front wing endplate after contact on the first lap, he never really had to fight a great deal of understeer. Despite the talk being about Mercedes and Lotus’ possible performance, Sauber have snuck under the radar and given a few teams plenty to worry about next Sunday.
At Ferrari, there was a sense of doom about their prospects in the race. While the 2012 car is pretty handy over 1 lap, as long as the driver can wrestle it round, it has a tendency to devour its tyres. Massa was on the radio complaining about rear degradation just 10 laps into the race and duly became the first man to pit for a fresh set of rubber while Alonso spent much of the afternoon in management mode – trying to manage the tyres, trying to manage to keep the car pointing in the right direction and trying to manage Maldonado all over his gearbox. Massa struggled all weekend and never looked like troubling the points, his retirement after contact with Senna giving the Fiorano outfit a clear illustration that they should start seeking a replacement for the number 2 seat. Alonso on the other hand is an absolute superstar of the sport in my eyes and I’m relishing seeing him outperform the car this season. Vettel, Hamilton and Button can all have their almost perfectly designed machines but Fernando’s 5th place today was one of his best drives and my respect for his abilities has grown even more. I’m sure he’d like a more balanced car but as long as he keeps dragging that thing across the line in a respectable position, his stock within the F1 world will only keep climbing.
Michael Schumacher disconsolately pushes his Mercedes W03 back to the garage after retiring from the Australian Grand Prix
Mercedes had an absolutely disastrous race. Tipped to be the surprise team of the weekend (rumours of a possible podium were widespread) yet they sacrificed too much of their race performance on ensuring a good qualifying position. They clearly wanted a front row grid slot and were running with a high top speed setting; the gear ratio pattern needed for that to work meant that they never got close to the big boys as they ran more moderate gearings. Schumacher looked strong in the early stages and I would have been fascinated to see how the battle between him and Vettel would have panned out. If nothing else, hopefully the fact that he has a strong car underneath him will inspire some of the old Schumacher back into life. Rosberg will even more unhappy tonight. The past two seasons he has shown that he is a force to be reckoned with as he outqualified and outscored his more illustrious teammate but on Saturday he was left down in 7th place in qualifying and his race today was marred by higher than expected tyre degradation and a collision with Perez that robbed him and the team of some much needed points. The W03 is the most innovative car on the grid but like the Ferrari it seems that a step forward in one area means a step back in another. They need to live up to their potential soon or they’ll be relegated back to the midfield.
Lotus too failed to live up to their billing. Grosjean had a terrible getaway and was down in 7th when he tangled with Maldonado while Kimi’s qualifying showing was nowhere near as strong as he had been in testing. His race pace was good and he fought well to finish 7th but he should have been even higher. The talk was that Lotus had the most balanced car on the grid but Raikkonen didn’t find it easy to pass the others and would have been down in 9th had Perez and Rosberg not collided. The team needs to focus on qualifying because I’m sure that the car is probably better than the Ferrari and the Sauber but it can’t live up to that billing if it’s going to be stuck behind a Toro Rosso for half the race. Oh, but Kimi deserves an award for his radio transmission of the day for his shouting and demanding to know “why am I getting the blue flags all the time?” only to be told that they are for the cars that he is trying to lap… It’s been a while eh, Kimi?
Maldonado rues his mistake after hitting the concrete wall and missing out on 6th place
Oh how different it could have been for Williams. Maldonado was absolutely superb today right up until he made the tiniest mistake on the last lap of the race. Chasing Alonso for fifth, he momentarily took his eye off the ball and lost the backend leaving him hurtling into the wall and out of the race. His potential 8 points for 6th place would have been more than Williams scored throughout all of last season and would have given the team a much needed boost in morale. Despite that, I was impressed by both the FW34 and Maldonado. The car looks to be a very solid midfield performer and the team finally have a decent engine under them which is where they were losing a lot of time last season. Maldonado too looked very strong today, he stayed with Alonso pretty much all race and despite an early collision with Grosjean was never really troubled until the last lap incident. I may have thought he was simply there because of his sponsorship connections but today he showed everyone that he is a very talented racer and hats off to him for that. It was a different story for Bruno Senna mind you. I had high hopes that finally he would be able to prove himself in a decent race seat but he never got going this weekend. He was way down in qualifying and was t-boned at the start today and despite making up some of the time that he lost, threw it all away with a sloppy collision with fellow countryman Massa. There’s talent there but it’s very rusty and Williams need him to perform to recover some of the pride that they lost last season.
Force India were by far my biggest disappointment of the day. I had very high hopes for the team this season with an exciting driver line-up and a pretty good car but today just wasn’t their day. Hulkenberg got tagged at the start which left him out after the first lap and while di Resta scored a point, it wouldn’t have happened had Perez not been holding up the Toro Rossos. The main issue seemed to be that the tyres just weren’t working how the team expected and di Resta often seemed to be struggling to get the power down. The team can be satisfied with a point for now but Vijay Maliya has lofty ambitions and having axed the consistent Adrian Sutil, results are required sooner rather than later.
As for the rest of the teams, Toro Rosso were very consistent today. Ricciardo took two well earned points while Vergne easily could’ve taken one for himself if he hadn’t lost traction out of the final corner on the last lap and let di Resta through. The battle between those two teammates will be one to follow this season. Caterham had some clear reliability issues, as they had in testing. Both Petrov and Kovalainen retired their cars and for separate reasons – that will worry the boys back in Norfolk! The car is a step up but still not enough to bridge the gap to the more established teams and they still won’t do that until the reliability is fixed. Marussia might have finished 14th and 15th and last of the classified finishers but at least they reached the chequered flag. The car had done no real mileage before Friday practice and it actually doesn’t look too bad. Charles Pic clearly struggled to get to grips with F1 as his + 5 laps statistic shows but Glock was more at home in the new car than last year’s effort. If they finish every race until the end of the season then they will finish above Caterham in the Constructors Championship – a big incentive. The less said about HRT the better really and hopefully they’ll be able to make the grid in Sepang although they need to improve their mirrors and radio communication as Karthikeyan was blissfully unaware of both Vettel and Alonso behind him during Q1 on Saturday.
Driver Reaction:
Jenson Button – “As a team it really shows how important the winter is. We had a really strong winter and qualifying really shows that. It’s nice to come away with a win in the first race of the season. Every win means a lot to you.”
Lewis Hamilton – “It was obviously a tough race – but congratulations to Jenson, it was a great finish for him. It would have been great to have had a one-two but it just wasn’t a good day for me. I just struggled out there and got a really shocking start which was the beginning of it all.”
Sebastian Vettel – “I’m very happy with myself today – I think it was the most we could have achieved. I felt good in the car. Congratulations to McLaren and to Jenson, I think he drove a fantastic race and was unbeatable today. I think we had a better car in the race and it seems to have a lot of potential, now it’s up to us to get to it.”
Mark Webber – “There are some positives to take out of today. Qualifying was difficult for us, but the race pace was better today, it was just that we didn’t have track position. We had a bit of luck with the safety car and I was quicker than Lewis at the end, but it’s a difficult track to overtake here – in Malaysia it would have been a different story. It was a strong start.”
Fernando Alonso – “We knew it would be a very complicated race and I am happy I managed to bring home a useful number of points. Today the car was better than yesterday and we were closer to the leaders. However, we still have a lot of work to do to reach those who are ahead of us in terms of performance. We are probably a second off pole and there are seven or eight teams who are all very close to one another. In one sense, that’s good news because if we can improve by a few tenths, then we can make up a few places. Next week in Malaysia will be a trial by fire, because Sepang is a verydemanding circuit, for the cars and the tyres.”
Felipe Massa – “This has been a really poor weekend for me. Already yesterday I suffered because the car was badly balanced and today, it was probably even worse, because after a few laps I was struggling with the tyres. The car was sliding and the degradation was much greater than for the others. I would not say I was driving aggressively and I was actually trying not to be hard on the tyres, but there was nothing I could do. We must work to understand why we could not reproduce the right balance on the car, as we had for example at the Barcelona tests. As for the contact with Senna, I think we can consider it a racing incident.”
Nico Rosberg – “The race did not turn out as we had hoped. The end was particularly unfortunate with Perez when we touched on the straight, causing a puncture which took away a points scoring finish. We have a lot of work to do to understand what went wrong, and how we can use the full potential which our car definitely shows. I’m still positive as Malaysia is a completely different track so I’m looking ahead to next weekend now.”
Michael Schumacher – “It was an unfortunate end to my race when I lost drive going into turn one. I was trying different gears and occasionally the drive came back, but in the end, I had to go onto the grass to avoid the risk of the car being forced into a spin. It was especially unfortunate as we have not had this problem during the winter tests and were very reliable. I believe I could have had a good race this afternoon, and I can still take some positives out of the weekend as we have seen our car was confirming our feelings, and is definitely a clear step forward.”
Kimi Raikkonen – “I believe I could have had a good race this afternoon, and I can still take some positives out of the weekend as we have seen our car was confirming our feelings, and is definitely a clear step forward. Overall the weekend was far from ideal, but the car feels good and to come back to 7th means we at least come away with some points.”
Romain Grosjean – “I think we could have achieved a great result today. It’s frustrating as I really wanted to make the chequered flag and even the podium, but on the positive side the car is performing very well. I was keeping pace with the guys in front of me and everything was looking good. The team deserved better because they have been working very hard, but by tomorrow morning it will all be a memory.”
Kamui Kobayashi – “I am very happy – for the team and myself. Finishing sixth is a great start to the season. After the start I nearly crashed into Bruno (Senna) who spun in front of me. I was lucky to avoid hitting him, but at the same time Sergio could not avoid touching me and then I had to do the whole race with a damaged rear wing.”
Sergio Perez – “”After I had to start last on the grid because of changing the gear box I knew I had to try everything to gain positions right after the start. I managed to get into 12th behind Kamui and touched his car while he had to avoid crashing into the Williams car in front of him. My front wing was then damaged and this was only one of the difficulties I had today during the race. I also had to save tyres, also for some time fuel, and I had to fight to defend my position. It really was a tough race for me.”
Pastor Maldonado – “The car looked good today. Our pace was quick and consistent and we were looking competitive right up until the moment I had on the last lap, which is very important. Unfortunately, I just lost the back of the car while pushing Alonso and I had nowhere to go.”
Daniel Ricciardo – “I don’t really know how that happened on the last lap. I saw blue flags and a lot of cars in front and I was sure I could make up at least one place because it was chaos. I was a bit lucky to be the last one in that group because I could have a clear picture of the other cars going off in front. Then I had a chance to attack Jean-Eric. He defended into Turn 13 and I thought I could make the switch back and I did, which put me in P9. The last few laps were crazy and I was pushing like hell. It was not easy to come back, but I never gave up, pushing all the time. I’m extremely happy and it’s great to score my first F1 points here at home in Australia, where the crowd has been just fantastic all weekend long.”
Paul di Resta – “It’s always nice to start the season with a point, but it was not looking too promising until the last few laps when my engineer told me that I was catching the cars ahead of me. Fortunately I had saved quite a bit of KERS for the last corner, which helped me get a good run on Vergne and beat him to the line for tenth. So it was a pretty exciting final lap. It’s a good way to start the season, but it’s clear we have a lot of work to do because we were struggling for pace at the start of each stint, which hurt my overall race pace. Even so, considering where I started and the weekend we’ve had, I don’t think I can be disappointed to have come away with a point.”
One of these men will be World Champion come December but who will it be?
So there we go then, race one done and dusted. But don’t think there’ll be a nice long break between now and the next one as round two takes place this weekend in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. We’ll bring you the qualifying review and race preview on Saturday before the comprehensive race review on the Sunday. Hope you enjoyed reading this and see you on Saturday!
The Eternal Sunshine of the Sporting Mind 