Hamilton wins eventful Australian GP

F1 Grand Prix, GP Australia, Albert Park

Lewis Hamilton has won the first GP of the season by simply staying out of trouble. With only 7 cars to the finish it was a matter of finishing. Heidfeld is the second man on the podium, joined by Nico Rosberg. Alonso is 4th, followed by Kovalainen.

The first start of the season was immediately in for some spectacle. Massa made his reputation at Australia true by immediately going off in the first corner, having pushed the throttle a bit too early. He is however lucky to rejoin the track and fit a new nose cone in the pitlane.

Due to other accidents that cause Webber to enter his pitbox for repairs, Fisichella, Button, Vettel and Davidson are out in the first lap. As a result, the new safety car makes its first display for a single lap.

The events cause Raikkonen to move up from 16th to 8th place while Fernando Alonso is 10th behind David Coulthard. At the front, Hamilton puts in a series of fastest laps and slowly pulls away from Kubica.

By lap 15, Hamilton has found the right pace and is a full second faster than the rest of the field. He has 10 seconds advantage over the Pole, who on his behalf is just a second ahead on Kovalainen. Raikkonen is meanwhile still blocked behind Barrichello and despite being close he is unable to overtake the Brazilian. In the back of the field, Sutil has abandoned the race and Piquet is driving in last position, probably taking it easy to not make too much mistakes in his first GP.

Kubica is the first to pit in lap 17. Hamilton is second to do so in lap 19.

Lap 20 then finally marks Raikkonen being able to pass Barrichello, and he immediately shows the potential of his Ferrari. The World Champion is actually able to pull away from Barrichello at a rate of more than 2 seconds a lap.

In lap 22, the rest of the field finally follow to make their stops while Trulli abandons from the race after simply taking out his steering wheel in the pitlane. Heidfeld hereby manages to pass Rosberg.

Alonso stays out for a bit longer and is actually on the harder compound, contrary to most of the competitors around and ahead of him on the grid. The extra fuel and the harder tyre may explain part of his qualifying deficit of yesterday.

In lap 26, Massa attempts to pass Coulthard in the first corner, at the expense of the Red Bull drivers who is launched into the air. Due to the debris left on the track, the safety car is once more deployed. Raikkonen who was about to enter the pitlane therefore could not and stayed on the circuit. Alonso is meanwhile also told to save as much fuel as possible as he was undoubtedly also planned to make his pitstop. Last year at Canada, the Spaniard even had to enter under the SC the pitlane to take fuel and take the penalty wit him. This time, he pits at an allowed time, together with Kubica - the latter already completing his second stop.

Behind the SC, Hamilton is first, Kovalainen second and third already is Raikkonen. Not for long however as Raikkonen was too optimistic to overtake Kovalainen and went off, rejoining the track in last position. The Finn makes his stop just one lap later.

Unfortunately for Ferrari, Felipe Massa abandons at the same time with technical problems. Piquet has also retired his car at the side of the circuit. Sato joins the club one lap later, leaving just 12 cars in the race.

Alonso does not have any of these issues and is closely on the tail of Kubica, hoping that the Pole will make a mistake sooner or later. Bourdais is surprisingly just ahead of the battling two.

By lap 43, Raikkonen has joined Glock in the back of the field. When trying to close down on the Toyota, he touches the grass and spins in the same corner as he went off ten laps ago. One lap later Glock violently goes off the track and ruins his car. He went wide in turn 12 and then jumps on the gras. Timo is fine but apparently shook up by the events.

The safety car is deployed once more and Barrichello dives in the pitlane right away. At leaving his pit area, the fuel hose was still connected. The fuel hose disconnects without problems but leaves a pit crew member on the ground. Barrichello is handed a stop and go just 2 laps later as he made his pitstop when the pitlane was closed.

Alonso and Kovalainen make their final stops and rejoin in the back of the pack.

When the safety car left the track, Alonso shows what he is worth and passed Kovalainen. Meanwhile Kubica and Nakajima touch each other at the expense of Kubica. Nakajima manages to rejoin the track but also with a damaged car. All in all, Hamilton is lucky to have made his pitstop just ahead of the SC period, otherwise he would also have been at the back of the pack.

Raikkonen is on top of that unable to follow the rest and tries to complete the race with obvious problems. Any finish is now good for points as there are just 9 cars left on the track. It was however not to be as 3 laps later his race is also over and out.

6 laps to go and Alonso is having trouble to keep Kovalainen's McLaren behind him. Sebastien Bourdais manages to pull away from the two.

With only 3 more laps, Bourdais is also out with a blown Ferrari engine.

Alonso eventually held his position after switching places with the Finnish McLaren driver.