Luke’s Weekend Review – Australian GP 2024

On the restart on lap 19 we see Leclerc running in 2^nd closing in on the leader Sainz, but Ferrari pull team orders as they were looking at the bigger picture and asked him to hold position to ensure Ferrari extract the maximum points and not get into a crash between themselves. Down at Alpine we see them having a heart stopping moment as we see Esteban Ocon’s rear wheel also smoking like Verstappen’s which meant he had to go to the pits, but after a tyre change the team confirmed that it was just a tear off in the brake ducts. This still put Ocon’s on the backfoot for the rest of the race as he was now with an extra pitstop than everyone else on the field.

Sergio Perez on his second stint seems to be flying as we see him get past Geroge Russell on lap 21 and later get easily past Alonso on lap 27 to get him into the top 5 on the hunt for the podium to try and recoup some points for Red Bull. At the front, Sainz seemed to be in a very comfortable position as when we were approaching mid-way through the race he was setting fastest lap after fastest lap each lap while he was building up a gap to protect from the undercut from his teammate Leclerc as he was 5 seconds ahead at the time.

With a few different strategies on the field, we see some team orders taking place as we see the Haas drivers swap places on lap 24 given that their drivers were on different tyre strategies and making sure they’re in the best position to score points later in the race. McLaren also opted for a driver swap on lap 29 given that Norris was on much fresher tyres but after a few laps Piastri advised the team that Norris needs to go quicker in order not to slow him down and sure enough Norris got the hurry up a lap later.

The end of the second stint was coming to an end as on lap 34 we hear Leclerc coming on the radio saying that his front left was reaching the end of it’s life as we also see Norris closing in on him as well and at the end of lap Leclerc was called into the pits for his last stop. Leclerc manages to come out just ahead of Perez and when Perez tried to come at Leclerc, Alonso was trying to get Perez. After a small battle between the drivers, we see Perez pit on lap 36 for some fresh boots and comes out in 9^th while Zhou also goes into the pits and like Bottas, he had some wheel nut issues and had an extremely long pit bringing him out in last.

On lap 38 we see Piastri lock up on turn 13 going onto the grass and then was called into the pits as this cost him a few tenths and probably flat spotted his tyres. Norris followed suit on lap 40 and came in for his last stop to also protect from the undercut from Leclerc and Piastri however he comes out behind Leclerc but with much fresher tyres. A few laps later, on lap 45 we see Magnussen managing to clear the Williams of Alex Albon after battling together for a few laps to get into P11 and protect his teammate who was running in P10 at the time getting Haas another Championship point. Pierre Gasly was under investigation from the stewards for potentially crossing over the pitlane line again like he did in qualifying where he managed to get away with a reprimand but this time he wasn’t as lucky and got a 5 second penalty which would be added to his race time at the end of the race.

Coming into the closing stages of the race we see Russell pit on lap 46 after a mammoth stint of 36 laps on his Hards and comes out 3 seconds behind Alonso to battle with him until the end and try to get into P6 which was the only place he was fast enough to get today. On Lap 54 is where it started to get interesting between the pair as Russell is within DRS and attacking Alonso but as always, the wily old fox places his car in all the right places to defend. However, did Alonso take it too far this time? On lap 58 we see Russell take a big shunt at turn 6 and brings out the VSC as he went into the gravel and into the barriers bringing him out back in the middle of the track. This incident brings out the VSC once more given it was the last lap and race finished under the VSC. Mercedes complained to the stewards about this incident as they were claiming that Alonso brake tested Russell which led to the crash and the stewards did mention that they will investigate this matter after the race as they summoned both drivers to see them after the race. After investigation, the stewards saw it the same as Mercedes and handed Alonso a Drive through penalty and given that he wasn’t able to serve it this was converted to a 20 second penalty added to his race time along with 3 penalty points on his license.

Carlos Sainz took the chequered flag under the VSC followed by Charles Leclerc, Lando Norris, Oscar Piastri, Sergio Perez, Fernando Alonso, Lance Stroll, Yuki Tsunoda, Nico Hulkenberg and Kevin Magnussen forming the top 10 however Alonso was pushed down to 8^th place from 6^th due to his penalty. Sainz took the driver of the day award which was well deserved given that he went from being out of a race due to his appendix to winning a race on his first race back. His teammate Leclerc was able to get the fastest lap of the race ensuring Ferrari get the maximum points at Albert Park.

Who do you think was the biggest winners and the biggest losers of the Australian GP? We now head into a week break before we get back on track in Suzuka for the Japanese GP.