2013 Australian GP - Albert Park

[amouzouris]

Yes, best race pace.
The Lotus and redbull are up there as well. I guess the first race of the season the strategy will warp things a bit, as the teams familarize themselves with the tyres, but ferrari do seem to be able to hang onto redbull. It's very drivable as well, as felipe is no complaining or spinning out as he usually does.

Although Ferrari does have the best race pace as a team... Raikkonen had the best race pace today. That said we don't know how much time was lost behind Sutil and Vettel. The car seems to fair better in the race than in qualifying again, as it is normal since it is based on the F2012. A dry qualifying in Malaysia ( i know there is a great chance of not getting it ) will give us a clearer picture of where everyone stands.

So, upgrades. We saw the new upper fin on the front brake ducts and the absence of the so called shark mouth. Anyone notice something else different? I am not sure but I think the lower half of the sidepod turning vanes is different. Has anyone got a good pic of that?

[Neno]

Bianchi was FANTASTIC today. Even his fastest lap is very impressive, i don't know when he stop for the last time but to be only one tenth slower than Massa and Vettel time it's fabolous.

Bianchi is very underated driver and even for me who is fan of Bianchi, I was suprised with his lap time. But i did expect him to be much faster then both caterham and chilton, he is on another dimension then them. I am just dissapointed that he couldnt get better seat like in Force India. But am sure if he continue with results as today next season he will drive much better car in some midfield team

[Shrieker]

According to Ted, Grosjean didn't have the final updates like floor and splitter until Saturday. He had only 2 laps of dry running with them. That sums up the vast difference between him and his team mate.

I'd love to have seen Merc go the 3 stop route. I bet Lewis would've held them off but probably he would've been overtaken at the pits. Maybe just maybe he could've challenged Massa though.

Kimi came from nowhere to win. Lotus have done a fantastic job with their car. Cold conditions weren't really their strong point last season. If they've also managed to retain hot weather performance, Kimi will be a strong candidate for the title.

[Rikhart]

According to Ted Grosjean didn't have the final updates like floor and splitter until Saturday. He had only 2 laps of dry running with them. That sums up the vast difference between him and his team mate.

I'd love to have seen Merc go the 3 stop route. I bet Lewis would've held them off but probably he would've been overtaken at the pits. Maybe just maybe he could've challenged Massa though.

Kimi came from nowhere to win. Lotus have done a fantastic job with their car. Cold conditions weren't really their strong point last season. If they've also managed to retain hot weather performance, Kimi will be a strong candidate for the title.

Not to mention grosjean had twice the winter testing Kimi had, thats wrong. Kimi tested some upgrades, grosjean tested others, so that does not explain him being nearly lapped, at all.

[ziggy]

Nico said in an interview they were surprised by tyre degradation. Initialy they wanted to do 2 stops, but they couldn't because of the tyres. Seems merc's tyre problems are far from over. Nico's face after his race said it all.

[Lorenzo_Bandini]

It has to be said that Kimi had the luxury to run in clean air nearly all the race, while Alonso was stuck behind someone.

But anyway, Kimi was fantastic today.

[i70q7m7ghw]

It has to be said that Kimi had the luxury to run in clean air nearly all the race, while Alonso was stuck behind someone.

But anyway, Kimi was fantastic today.

Kimi made plenty of overtakes to get that clean air. It was a luxury he rightfully earned. Alonso failed to pass his team mate on the track, he had to do it in the pits.

[Donuts]

According to Ted Grosjean didn't have the final updates like floor and splitter until Saturday. He had only 2 laps of dry running with them. That sums up the vast difference between him and his team mate.

I'd love to have seen Merc go the 3 stop route. I bet Lewis would've held them off but probably he would've been overtaken at the pits. Maybe just maybe he could've challenged Massa though.

Kimi came from nowhere to win. Lotus have done a fantastic job with their car. Cold conditions weren't really their strong point last season. If they've also managed to retain hot weather performance, Kimi will be a strong candidate for the title.

Not to mention grosjean had twice the winter testing Kimi had, thats wrong. Kimi tested some upgrades, grosjean tested others, so that does not explain him being nearly lapped, at all.

Does'nt have to much to do with who did what amount of testing(start/race strategy/traffic was the difference). Romian Grosjean has the speed, we've all seen it, he will be on top of things for the next race(I hope for his sake).

[sjns]

Though given least years Car they would have done 4 stops. Bare in mind they have done the Same amount of Stops as most of the teams. Hamiltons pace in the last stint didnt seem that Bad.

In general, I dont get what the fuzz is all about. Whoever Expected Merc building a championship contender lacks a Bit of realizm. Although that is their ultimate goal, this Car seems like a huge improvement. Give them some races until you Start writing them Off...

[MercedesAMG]

Nico said in an interview they were surprised by tyre degradation. Initialy they wanted to do 2 stops, but they couldn't because of the tyres. Seems merc's tyre problems are far from over. Nico's face after his race said it all.

I wouldn't think so.

First, Nico said they had problems with the front tires.

Second, RedBull also claimed the same problems.

[stefan_]

It was a good start of the season, very enjoyable race to watch. With 5 rookies on the grid, one might think that some sort of T1 incident was inevitable, but they got out of it as clean as possible. Thumbs up for that.

Massa's start was awesome (combined with another crap one from Mark) and he was on fire, very good performance and it's good to see Felipe up there again. The Ferraris look very good overall, but not good enough. The fact that Vettel managed to put a 2s gap in the first 2 laps scared me a little bit, but it's good that it didn't last.

Sutil was very good also, too bad he missed 2012.
The new guys looked very good, I am glad that they didn't do stupid things
Mark said that he lost KERS during the first part of the race, so that didn't help to get something more.
Maldonado is in his own league again, sabotaging himself and blaming the car.

As for Lotus and Kimi, they couldn't have started the season better, it was a superb victory. I was kind of disappointed by Grosjean, but there must be an explanation about his apparent lack of pace.

P.S.: Both of Kimi's victories since his return last year were with Alonso 2nd and Vettel 3rd.

[vall]

very good onepening race! I smell a good season ahead. I would have liked the last laps to be more trilling with 3-4 cars within 5 sec, but it was not meant to be.

What's up wth Masa? In the begining he was very strong, but agian as the race progressed he faided away and was unable to challange Vettel. In the begining he was faster.....

[hendrix]

It has to be said that Kimi had the luxury to run in clean air nearly all the race, while Alonso was stuck behind someone.

But anyway, Kimi was fantastic today.

Kimi made plenty of overtakes to get that clean air. It was a luxury he rightfully earned. Alonso failed to pass his team mate on the track, he had to do it in the pits.

Kimi made a good overtake over Hamilton at the start but Alonso too. Then I don´t remember a lot of overtakes more at least with car with a similar pace.
Alonso tried to pass Massa in the first 4 laps but with the same car and the same tyres it was too risk and Alonso has learn how important could be a DF in a so closed championship. Then he push a lot after the last pitstop and with clean air was the best pace of the race. Kimi was fantastic but Alonso too, and this is are good news for the championship.

[myurr]

I'm sorry, but ditch this car, most of the updates from last year to this is in the detail, should be transferrable
Front and rear brake ducts, drivetrain cover

If you look only at Jenson's performances last year, you wouldn't think that the McLaren was that good a car. Top 3 - 4 only rather than the out and out quickest for much of the season. McLaren's big problems seem to be a car with a narrow operating window, a driver with a narrow operating window, and a relative rookie whose pace is unknown. They have no real way of judging the pace of the car or assessing it's weaknesses. They don't know if Button is extracting all the pace the car has to give, or is leaving half a second on the table because he's not comfortable with the car. Do they need to take a backward step with the performance of the car to make it more to Button's liking so that he can extract more from it, and how will that affect Perez?

I'm British so I should be a Button fan. He's a nice guy and on his day can beat anyone. But I have a niggling doubt over his ability to develop a car over a season - has he ever successfully done so? Last year when it looked like McLaren were forcing Hamilton and Button to co-develop the setup for a given weekend all they seemed to achieve was slowing Hamilton down. In his championship winning year the cars pace seemed to get worse the more they developed the car, presumably in part due to Button's feedback and preferences.

I hope that Button and McLaren are able to prove me wrong, but the signals coming from the team do not bode well. I'm a Hamilton fan so will have to admit bias here, but I feel one of the biggest thing holding back McLaren's development of the car at the moment is in fact the drivers. With the pull rod front suspension setup changes take longer to implement leading to further woe whenever a driver goes the wrong way with the setup of the car - something Button appears prone to doing.

Contrast that to Mercedes who have a proven driver who is known for being able to adapt to the car, with a really solid and consistent second driver who also seems able to adapt, with a technical team that is starting to gel, and a good baseline car with arguably the best suspension system out there. They can just chase better aero numbers now knowing that the drivers will extract the additional pace and be able to give accurate guidance about the aero balance to help the engineers choose the right compromises.

[vall]

Fred made a very good start and it could have been 2nd after the first corner, but two cars ahead closed the way nd he had to move to the left.