Who'd have thought it: Ferrari is the team everyone else in F1 is chasing
If the first two Formula One races this year showed that Ferrari is back in the hunt, Sunday’s event in Australia made it clear that they are now the team everyone else is chasing.
And while the field was hunting Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc from Lap 1, by the finish he had managed to completely vanish from their view.
Besides the win, Leclerc left Australia having taken pole position, fastest lap, and was voted driver of the day by the fans.
Second place Sergio Perez finished more than 20 seconds behind, and Perez’s Red Bull teammate, Max Verstappen, had his day ended by mechanical failure for the second time in three races.
Leclerc joined Perez in performing as a solo artist, as his Ferrari teammate Carlos Sainz had his nightmare weekend ended when his car ended up stuck in the gravel on Lap 2.
Asked following the race if it was his easiest win ever, Leclerc did not try to deny it. Verstappen had been Leclerc’s only real competition before being forced to pull over with a smoking engine and the smell of leaking fuel on lap 39.
The Red Bull had challenged Leclerc for the lead on a Lap 27 restart following a Sebastian Vettel crash, but that would be the last company the Ferrari would have for the day. The win was Leclerc’s second of the season and gives him 71 points for the year, 34 better than second-ranked George Russell, and already a 46-point lead over reigning champion Verstappen, whose season now consists of one race win and two mechanical DNFs.
Mercedes now occupies second place in the constructor standings, despite a weekend in which their pace looked perhaps even worse than the first two races. After qualifying in fifth and sixth, both silver arrows were able to get past a wheel-spinning Lando Norris at the start, and a well-timed pit stop allowed Russell to end up in front of teammate Lewis Hamilton.
Hamilton seemed unhappy with his team’s strategy, telling them over the radio that "you guys put me in a really difficult position." Mclaren’s duo of Norris and home-town favorite Daniel Ricciardo held on to finish fifth and sixth, their first double points finish of the season.
While it may only have earned them a single point, the strategy employed by Williams for driver Alex Albon was brilliant. Albon was one of six cars to start the race on hard tires, which initially appeared to be the wrong choice, as they were forced to remain on the track through two early safety car periods, as all the medium tire starters were able to make their required pit stops.
While the remaining starting sets of tires had all been disposed of by Lap 39, Albon remained on-track. Seemingly defying logic, rather than suffering worsening performance, Albon managed to keep increasing his advantage on the drivers behind him, and when he was finally forced by rule to change to the mediums on the final lap, he had managed to increase his lead over Zhou Guanyu in 11th-place to 20 seconds, and a solid pit stop allowed him to reenter and still finish in 10th-place.
The hard tire strategy appeared to be a major contributing factor to Sainz’s early exit. Starting ninth, he immediately fell to 14th at the start. Likely feeling pressure to gain positions quickly, he attempted to pass on tires that he admitted after the race were not yet sufficiently warmed up.
He was unable to make the turn while attempting to overtake Zhou at the third corner, resulting in rolling backwards across the track and narrowly avoiding being t-boned before coming to rest with his wheels trapped in the gravel.
Through the field:
Fernando Alonso looked to have one of the fastest cars in qualifying, but a Q3 crash led to a 10th-place start for the Alpine driver. Trying the hard tire start strategy proved disastrous and ended up requiring a second tire change when he quickly wore through his first set of mediums.
Alonso ended up finishing last (17th) of the drivers still running in the 20-car starting field, despite having enough speed to turn in the second-fastest lap overall.
Week 3 was also disappointing for the Haas team, following a strong start to the season. Mick Schumacher and Kevin Magnussen both started in the bottom quarter of the grid, and neither was any threat to finish in the top 10, ultimately finishing 13th and 14th, respectively.
Aston Martin nearly saved an absolute disaster of a weekend with some innovative strategy. With the field under caution for the Sainz crash on Lap 4, Stroll switched to the medium tires, completed one lap, and immediately switched back to the hard, negating the requirement to stop again later in the race.
Unfortunately, the Canadian appears to be driving without much confidence, finishing 12th and managing to get his second penalty of the weekend, this time for weaving in front of Valtteri Bottas.
Stroll’s teammate Sebastian Vettel also appears to be uncomfortable in the new car after missing the first two events following a positive Covid-19 test. Vettel dropped out following losing control and crashing on Lap 23, saying in a post-race interview that the car was “maybe too much of a handful for me today”.
Up next:
The frequent flyer miles will now start to build for teams as the series travels to Imola for the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix in two weeks, followed by Formula One’s first ever trip to Miami in May.