Australian Grand Prix: The Review

And breathe...wow! What an interesting battle we saw from all cars involved in Melbourne on Sunday morning.

I'll be giving a short recap on the key moments in the race here and finally what impact it could have on Round 4!

It was a great start from Charles Leclerc who was able to hold his pole position through the first few tough turns, Hamilton who started in fourth passed Sergio Perez in 3rd on turn one after the Mexican moved too wide after his first successful defence with Hamilton taking the inside route.

Further down the track, Carlos Sainz of Ferrari was struggling badly at the start and on Lap 2 spun out of the race after going too fast into turn 9 across the grass and onto the gravel which left him stationary and forced him out early, not a good start for Ferrari as a team despite Leclerc still topping the pile.

This left the race at a standstill for 5 laps with a virtual safety car being upgraded to a safety car with Leclerc holding his position at the restart. Laps 19-24 saw the top 6 all pit with George Russell being the man to emerge victorious in this tactical battle after a hard crash for Sebastian Vettel on turn 4 saw the German finish his bad weekend return to F1 early on Lap 23 and a safety car deployed which Mercedes took full advantage of.

Russell came out of the pits in third with fresh tyres while the other Mercedes driver Hamilton had just been victim of a great move by Sergio Perez moving him into second but then to 5th still in front of Hamilton after the safety car was deployed, leaving Lewis losing position and Red Bull in front of their Mercedes rival of last season.

Max and Charles had their regular ongoing fight on Lap 27 where the cars sat alongside each other going into turn one, but Charles kept his composure and defended the pole position well, the other Red Bull driver was more successful in his overtaking attempt with Sergio Perez taking P3 from George Russell on Lap 36 with one of the four DRS activation zones coming in handy. Perez's P3 soon turned into P2 after a technical fault occurred in Max Verstappen's car as smoke began to come out of his car causing his second DNF in three races this season.

While Leclerc cruised along with a large gap in front, the shock was coming from P5 where Alex Albon of Williams was still going without taking a pit stop, a strategy which is unconventional but certainly came off well holding this position, the race finished with him though having to take a pit stop after 57 Laps on the same tyres but despite this his drive was so good he just barely tipped Zhou's Alfa Romeo to 10th which gave Williams their first point of the season in sensational fashion.

The race ended with Leclerc coming out on top with Perez and George Russell taking P2 and P3, Hamilton finished P4 just behind Russell by a few seconds interestingly George did not get the shout to give up his spot to Lewis like we have heard with former Mercedes driver Valtteri Bottas over the years, who finished in a great 8th position in Melbourne on Sunday for Alfa Romeo.

Riccardo and Norris finished P5 and 6 with just 0.4 seconds between them and Riccardo marking his home Grand Prix with his first points of the season, a solid take from McLaren overall. Looking further down the grid we saw a disappointing race Magnussen finishing 14th compared to the 5th and 9th that he took in the first two rounds. But it was Charles Leclerc's and Ferrari's day picking up from his team mate Carlos Sainz's mistake and DNF and holding out for the pole position he earned in qualifying which has put him 32 points ahead in the Driver's Championship.

My driver of the day has to be Alex Albon who held P5 without taking any pit stops for 57 Laps before unfortunately being made to go into the pits, despite this he finished with a point position for Williams in P10 giving them their first of the season. A great tyre management and pace set from Albon stole a bit of the shine off Leclerc's great win for me.

Let us know your thoughts and comments on the race below, who was your driver of the day?