Okay, I’m a big F1 fan and the Melbourne GP was eagerly anticipated. After it came and went my first big impression? Damn the safety car sounds good! There’s something about the deep sound of the 6.3l V8 compared to the F1 cars 2.4l high-revving engines.
Initial thoughts post-race? A lot of errors from the drivers and teams. Not necessarily because of the lack of traction control, but just some random unforced errors. Maybe it was first race of the season type jitters, but some mistakes were pretty unforgivable. Barrichello going into the closed pit-lane for fuel was a good idea (better than letting him run out of fuel on the track) yet sending him out when the pit-lane exit was still closed was a bad error (and let’s not get into the whole ‘driving off with the re-fueling rig still on the car’ thing). In my opinion the rules regarding re-fueling and pitting under safety car conditions need to be revised. Being punished for somebody else’s error is not something that is in spirit with the sport.
All told, it was a pretty exciting race, however due to having so many retirements meant that there wasn’t as much real racing and overtaking attempts as there should have been. Ferrari looked like they would come along and dominate the entire weekend, but after a dismal qualifying the race was full of mistakes from their drivers. Honda surprised most people in qualifying and could have been in-line for some decent points, but their race went downhill from lap one. The only people that had a decent weekend was McLaren, the only team to bring home both drivers.
I think this season is going to be the best ever, once all the nerves have settled down, and new cars are released. All teams are now under pressure to perform in Malaysia, but only time will tell who has the best package. After all, one down, seventeen to go.
