Planet-F1

Austalian GP: Race Winners + Losers

Sunday 16th March 2008

So, if you can have that much fun in the dry - what would it be like when it's wet - the World Rally Championship...?

Star of the Race
Lewis Hamilton, McLaren, 1st
Lewis Hamilton's dominance was perhaps one of the more boring features of the race. His opening sequence of laps was unlike anything I've seen at the start of a grand prix since I've been looking at timing screens since 2002. The sector times were an almost constant barrage of purple. He set Fastest Laps on Laps 3,5,6,7,9,11,13,14,15 and 17.

Had the run of second McLaren pit-stops gone the other way, with Hamilton pitting later instead of Kovalainen, then it would have been a travesty. As it was, Heikki got the rub of the green and had to battle it out with Alonso for 4th and 5th.

Lewis took yet aother astonishingly professional victory.

Overtaking Move Of The Race
Lap 57, Heikki Kovalainen, McLaren
Albert Park is not the easiest place to get past someone and Fernando Alonso, fighting for 4th place is certainly not going to make it any easier than he has to. Especially considering it is a McLaren coming through.

So Kovalainen's pass on him on the penultimate lap of the race was a really sharp move. The fact that he completely ruined it half a lap later doesn't take anything away from it - Heikki will probably not bang his pitlane rev limiter ever again in his GP career.

WINNERS
Max Mosley
FIA boss Max Mosley's attempts to get rid of traction control have been thoroughly vindicated by an enthralling first race without it. We had more action and incident going into Turn 1 than we usually have and more mistakes made over the course of the race.

In the heat of battle, making a move and relying on the technology to sort it all out is no longer an option, as both Ferrari drivers found out in the course of the race. That is one thing that all the testing in the world won't prepare you for.

TV Coverage
The host broadcaster in Melbourne should get the contract for the season. Though we lost sight of a few of the key incidents on the opening lap, there was just so much going off it was hardly surprising. What was interesting, was that the sound feed from the trackside cameras came through really crisply. So when Timo Glock turned his Toyota into a rallycross vehicle on Lap 45, the soundtrack of the accident made it far more dramatic. We also got sound from the roving pitlane cameras trained on celebs like Kelly Osbourne (not that that's a particular recommendation.)

The post-race scenes tracking in front of an exuberant Lewis Hamilton as he bounced up the steps to the podium and embraced Nico Rosberg captured the total exhilaration of the moment. The behind-the-scenes, behind-the-podium footage was exceptional.

Nick Heidfeld, BMW, 2nd
Starting from fifth place on the grid Nick Heidfeld probably thought he was in for one of his long, lonely afternoons of 2007, when he soldiered on alone, just shy of the podium places, to claim an undramatic fourth place.

The three Safety Cars helped keep him up with the leader and swift work from the lollypop guy at his first pit-stop put him back in front of Nico Rosberg. It was good that they didn't touch wheels, but on the balance of probabilities, we are going to get an in-pitlane accident at some stage this season.

Nico Rosberg, Williams-Toyota, 3rd
It's good to see Championship rivals get all friendly with each other after an intense battle because it reflects on that dwindling commodity in international sport - sportsmanship. Lewis Hamilton congratulating Nico Rosberg after the race was part of a human drama we rarely see these days. It was Rosberg's first podium and though Glock's Safety Car on Lap 45 was responsible for promoting him above Kovalainen, he had shown that he had the measure of Nick Heidfeld on the opening lap.

Rosberg's continuing good form is testament to why Williams were so anxious to retain him and why McLaren were so keen to get him in their car.

Fernando Alonso, Renault, 4th
Strange to think that this might be Alonso's best result for the first half of the season. Given the strength of BMW and their proximity to McLaren and Ferrari, plus the continuing pace of Williams, this is less likely to be the start of things to come and more likely to be the best a man can get.

Here was a World Champion who looked just as good without traction control as he did with it, but the fact that later in the race his Renault couldn't live with the pace of Sebastien Bourdais in a Toro Rosso must be worrying.

In his private moments he must wonder if he has done the right thing by moving back to Renault. He could have been alongside Lewis Hamilton on the front row of the grid in a McLaren. He might have been on pole. There is no way he is going to become World Champion in 2008 and it's all his own making.

Though the smile of a man who has just overtaken a McLaren on the final lap of a race was one of great contentment, it can surely not make up for a season on the sidelines, no matter how much he wants to spin the line that he's back with "his family".

Sebastien Bourdais, Toro Ross, 7th
Bourdais trundled along happily and collected two points while he was walking back to the Toro Rosso garage. It may have been cruel luck to have lost 4th place when he was just three laps from the finish (and keeping Alonso at bay), but he was very lucky to be there in the first place.

Two points (and 7th place) on his debut is better than Vettel (one point and 8th place last year), but still not up with Jenson Button who took 6th for Williams in 2000.

ITV Coverage
The ITV coverage was excellent from the word go. It's always with some relief that we see Mark Blundell back in the pitlane, as his conjugation of the English language is always a joy to behold. And it's an even bigger reflief that Brundle has been given an FIA pass despite the earlier legal action against him for comments he made last season.

This season they've also got Tamara Ecclestone performing the kind of role formerly occupied by Beverly Turner - the Totty With The Microphone slot. Last year Radio 5 tried that with Holly Samos, but to no great effect, it being radio and her surname not being Ecclestone.

ITV's stroke of genius is that team personnel and drivers have GOT to be nice and take Tamara's eyelash-batting "oh gosh, really?" questions seriously because she's Bernie's daughter. She even got smiles out of Kimi Raikkonen.

Honda, DNF & DSQ
Never mind the fact that Rubens Barrichello got disqualified, Honda showed enough form this weekend to make them believe again. "I am in love with the team, I am in love with the progess we have made," he said after qualifying on Saturday (a quote very similar to one that Michael used to give).

He may have held Raikkonen up for 19 laps, but he didn't collect a train of cars behind