F1 Talk: Brilliant Bottas surprises everyone; Ferrari off the pace

A phenomenal drive from Valtteri Bottas gave him his first win in over a year after going winless in 2018. The Finn simply eased away from Lewis Hamilton after getting a mighty start and never looked like he was going to be challenged.

There was great news for the new Red Bull-Honda relationship as Max Verstappen took his first podium in Melbourne with a strong race as he finished just one second behind Hamilton.

The big surprise was the lack of pace from Ferrari. Coming into the season opener, they were favourites but the magic they had in pre-season testing disappeared and there will be a lot of scratching (of heads) over the next 10 days as they try to figure out where the pace has gone.

Hamilton started the 2019 season exactly as he finished his 2018 campaign by topping all of the free practice sessions and stealing pole position from Bottas by just over one tenth of a second. It was Hamilton’s 6th consecutive pole position at Albert Park, and an eight overall which equals the record of Michael Schumacher and Ayrton Senna who scored eight pole positions at Suzuka and Imola respectively. Hamilton also equals Schumacher with the most poles for one team, this being his 58th for Mercedes

Ferrari were 0.7 off the pace exactly as they were last year. The major differences for me is that they were very impressive in the speed traps last year and Mercedes were clearly worried – that has disappeared this year. Also, Ferrari were much closer during the race in 2018 (even before the virtual safety car which won them the race) they had no pace at all during the Grand Prix.

I cannot work out what is wrong with the car. Onboard it looks very easy to drive, no sliding, not much movement as it rides over the bumps and kerbs and the drivers are not complaining of a specific problem. There have been reports that they have turned their engines down because of a possible issue (which may explain the straight line speed deficit).

A theory I have is that the car is not generating enough temperature in the front tyres which is why it looks a little lazy in some of the slower corners. It also explains Vettel’s poor tyre wear as he may have suffered from “cold graining” on the front tyres. I am speculating but that is my best guess and I dearly hope Ferrari come back to take the fight to Mercedes in Bahrain and for the rest of the year.

Whilst Ferrari suffered, Verstappen capitalised by making good work of overtaking a struggling Vettel and it looked for a moment that the Dutchman would be able to overtake Hamilton as well. Hamilton said it was “no problem” when asked how he felt with Verstappen behind him but I really do think he fears Verstappen and so he should as he is incredibly exciting to watch and is very aggressive in defence and attack.

On Hamilton, the fact that he still took a 2nd place on what was an “off-day” for his standards show why he has won five world champions. With Bottas having a sensational day, the floor damage and not the optimal use of his tyres it does explain why Hamilton lost so much time.

Think about this, had Hamilton stayed ahead after turn one; he probably would have gone on to win the race because Bottas would have had to pit early to cover off Vettel and I highly doubt Bottas would have been able to overtake Hamilton on track. When was the last time Hamilton had a teammate genuinely overtake him? Add the discovery of the floor damage and it would have made Bottas look terrible – losing to a driver with a damaged car. It would have been a completely different story following the race and Bottas would have received a lot of backlash.

Lets talk about the midfield now.

It was a good weekend for the three rookies on this year’s grid with Alexander Albon, Lando Norris and George Russell outqualifying their team mates on a track which none had driven on before Friday and a track which is very hard to get up to speed on. It shows the natural speed of all three of them and their F1 careers have got off to a very good start.

Haas look like they are best of the rest but only just. The midfield is so tight that you have to get the strategy absolutely spot on. This was very clear from the Grand Prix as Norris, Sergio Perez and Albon all get caught behind Antonio Giovinazzi who had damage very early on (the team even considered retiring him) and also was made to go very long for his first stint so his tyres wear worn out.

This meant that they all missed out on the points as they lost a lot of time and the likes of Lance Stroll and Daniil Kvyat were able to go long and jump them whilst they got stuck behind the Giovinazzi train.

In fact, the whole field has closed up and already teams have found time from last year’s cars despite the new aerodynamic regulations which have come in for 2019 which should have made the cars 1.5 seconds slower.

Toro Rosso and Alfa Romeo have both found two seconds from this time last year.  Everyone has improved their cars, apart from Williams who have unfortunately gone backwards and are slower now than they were this time last season.

Interestingly Ferrari, Red Bull and Mercedes have gained the least time so it just shows that the midfield has caught up a little.

Albert Park is one of the toughest tracks on the F1 calendar to overtake on yet we saw some good racing on Sunday – definitely an improvement from the last two years. The new regulations have helped and Bahrain and China should see plenty of overtaking and good racing. Well done to Ross Brawn and Liberty Media for getting these regulations in for this season and for making them work. There was plenty of criticism over the winter that the new rules would not do anything but they have so we really should trust Liberty more and it makes me confident that further improvements can be made for 2021.

Another major rule change that worked was the point for fastest lap. This rule received a lot of backlash when it was announced a week before the Australian Grand Prix, I actually like it and my thoughts came true.

I think many people forgot about the massive ego of the drivers and how they are desperate to get every point they can get! Seeing Bottas, Hamilton and Verstappen wind things up at the end rather than simply cruising to the chequered flag is a big positive. It adds another element of intrigue and it will be fascinating at Monaco or Singapore which are traditionally pretty boring races to see the top drivers going for that extra point.

The risk vs. reward factor must be thought about and it will go wrong at some point this season. The lack of unpredictability is a problem with F1 at the moment but a point for fastest lap brings its own excitement and also brings a new dilemma to the teams and engineers as they will want their driver to just bring the car home but the driver will want to stop their rival from taking that extra point so they can have it for themselves.

It was Bottas who started the season in style and with Ferrari off the pace, Mercedes are the early favourites. But do not rule the Red team out yet, the pace is in the car somewhere and when its extracted, they will challenge the Silver Arrows and with Red Bull in the mix too – it is still game on as 20 races remain and you just cannot judge how a season is going to pan out on the opening race alone.