Normal Service Has been Resumed

"Normal service has resumed" a Mclaren Mechanic told Lewis Hamilton over the radio, "another seventeen races like that and its in the bag" and looking over todays performance it doesn't seem to be that far off the mark. frankly speaking, with no disrespect to Heidfeld, or Nico, if the game had played out just a little be differently it would have been a Mclaren 1-2.

Oh and talking about Nico, seeing Williams on the podium in the first race of the season was a happy surprise. all the potential that Nico and Williams showed last year is coming to fruit and its not just because the Red cars failed to perform they were good in their own right, so good in fact that they were the only other team other that the silver arrows to have both cars finish and they hustled Lewis all the way to the chequered flag. That reminds me the, we had predicted that the midfield was going to be tight, and was going to be closely fought, but we had expected to have BMW and Williams doing that not Ferrari.

And what a change a good team and attitude makes, last year at the same time after the first GP at the same place Flavio Briatore had described Heiki Kovalainen's debut as rubbish and today midway through the race he was leading the GP.

talking about Flavio, even though Alonso finished fourth, Renault's season opener was a disaster. the cars didn't do well, especially not to the standards of the performance that sowed that they had a two time world champion on board. and Nelson Piquet Jr. had a torrid time and then retired.

The race was marred by three safety car periods, One after the First lap mess which involved five cars and then some time in the middle and then Timo Glock had that awesome crash. during the third quarter of the race. all thru this Hamilton, The 23 year-old Briton, dominated an event characterised by safety car interventions following a series of dramatic incidents that all happened behind him.

Hamilton would build a lead, lose it behind the safety car, build it again, lose it again. You get the picture. But if he was impressive here a year ago, he was even better on Sunday, never losing his composure as he took the lead of the world championship with almost insouciant ease. He went on to prove that last year was no fluke for him and the others better watch out for him.

the race began with drama and ended in drama when the third safety car period cost a Mclaren 1-2, honda had a good perfomance of Barichello(later Disqualifieed from Sixth for exiting the pit lane under a red light) and barring the first corner incident the sign were there that even their second car would have been good. Sato was entertaining as usual, holding up the far superior car of Massa for some time, he deserves a better yet a tobust car which can stand the forces he puts the car through. oh and of the F1 rookies Sebastian Bourdias was impressive, he was set for 4th place finish if his Ferrari engine hadn't give up the ghost. Similarly both the Toyotas were impressive, with Timo Glock justifying Tokyo's faith in him until his crash, at least and Jarno Truli on the way to some points, when his engine died on him.


For the Italian uber team it wasnt a good day none of their cars finished, today Kimi as usual overdrove his car into retirement, for some reason no team ca provide him with a car that can stand the torture he puts them through, based on current performance last years Ferrari was the only car that could match him. Kimi is talented no doubt and should ahve had more race wins and championships to show for all the years he has spent in formula one, of his cars the Sauber's were perennial midfielder the Mclaren that he drove were fast but fragile, but Ferrari's have always been bullet proof at least for the last ten years they have been. but then Mclaren's ahve always been Fast but fragile, he has to learn to temper his driving style to the car or he will sqander his potential, Oh he was qualified 8th albeit 5 laps down and scored one point but some how no one imagined that he would be so far down in the points standing. Seeing that there were six Ferrari engined cars on the grid today that solitary point scored by the World Champion, no less wont please Maranello at all.

One thing that worries me is that only 8 cars were classified as finished of which only five ever went the complete race distance and there were three saftey car periods, this, even by Melbourne standards is pretty down, it makes you wonder weather it was luck or was the removal of driver aids that affecting, F1 needs to be more exciting not more dangerous, and its not as if it hasnt been exciting in the past. The closest season was last year. but

but that is not for me to think about, its time to head onwards to Sepang next week and let the games continue.

Pos	No	Driver	Team	Laps	Time/Retired	Grid	Pts
1	22	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren-Mercedes	58	1:34:50.616	1	10
2	3	Nick Heidfeld	BMW	58	+5.4 secs	5	8
3	7	Nico Rosberg	Williams-Toyota	58	+8.1 secs	7	6
4	5	Fernando Alonso	Renault	58	+17.1 secs	11	5
5	23	Heikki Kovalainen	McLaren-Mercedes	58	+18.0 secs	3	4
6	8	Kazuki Nakajima	Williams-Toyota	57	+1 Lap	13	3
7	14	Sebastien Bourdais	STR-Ferrari	55	+3 Laps	17	2
8	1	Kimi Räikkönen	Ferrari	53	Engine	15	1
Ret	4	Robert Kubica	BMW	47	Accident	2
Ret	12	Timo Glock	Toyota	43	Accident	18
Ret	18	Takuma Sato	Super Aguri-Honda	32	Transmission	19
Ret	6	Nelsinho Piquet	Renault	30	Accident damage	20
Ret	2	Felipe Massa	Ferrari	29	Engine	4
Ret	9	David Coulthard	Red Bull-Renault	25	Accident	8
Ret	11	Jarno Trulli	Toyota	19	Electrical	6
Ret	20	Adrian Sutil	Force India-Ferrari	8	Hydraulics	22
Ret	10	Mark Webber	Red Bull-Renault	0	Accident	14
Ret	16	Jenson Button	Honda	0	Accident	12
Ret	19	Anthony Davidson	Super Aguri-Honda	0	Accident	21
Ret	15	Sebastian Vettel	STR-Ferrari	0	Accident	9
Ret	21	Giancarlo Fisichella	Force India-Ferrari	0	Accident	16
DSQ	17	Rubens Barrichello	Honda	58	+52.4 secs	10

Note - Barrichello disqualified from sixth place for exiting the pits under a red light.

Race Results : Formula1.com