2023 ROLEX AUSTRALIAN GRAND PRIX ALBERT PARK

[Picci]

Bottom post of the previous page:

What did I just watch?

To think that all the shenanigans started because of a loose wheel and a bit of debris that we seem to be completely inept at resolving under normal SC conditions. Oh how so sensitive we have become.

I honestly don’t know what to say on this race. At least the right person won the race. I was concerned someone’d punt Max off on the last restart.

I think they’ll have to look into closing the pitlane during VSC/SC periods to mitigate the injustice caused to those that have already pitted, or that pit during the period and then get reshuffled down thanks to a subsequent red flag.

[PTRACER]

I pretty much switched off as soon as Max took the lead on Lap 12 (?) and didn't watch again until about Lap 52. Max was almost 1s behind Hamilton at the start of the lap and 2s ahead before the end of it and even had DRS after he got past the Mercedes. I'm fed up with races that are only decided by DRS.

And like what John said, absolutely nothing happened in the middle of the race, the F1 Highlights on YouTube confirmed that.

The repeated red flags really ruined it and then waiting for almost 40 minutes for them to restart a race that was never going to be a race because they were already on the final lap was pointless. Bit of a waste of an afternoon.

[Aty]

Gasly - no penalty. The altercation with teammate was deemed a racing accident. He drove a really good race (until that happened).


Gasly was investigated.

Hamilton wasn't investigated for what he has done to Verstappen.

Stroll wasn't investigated for what he has done to Leclerc.

Some are investigated, and some others get away. This is not first time.

[Star]

I've just seen the race and here are my thoughts.

It was a terrible start to the race for Verstappen, he totally got swamped by the Mercedes drivers and I doubt he expected that to happen. An awesome start by George Russell, and Hamilton was safe from Verstappen whilst he had the DRS from Russell ahead of him to neutralise the Red Bull.

A shame for Leclerc but I got the feeling he was as much to blame for his crash and being out of the race as anyone. Russell did well on the restart and looked solid, then it all turned bad for him.

Russell and Sainz were so unlucky that they decided to pit under the safety car after Albon's crash and lost places as a result only for the race to be red flagged. I mean his car was in an awkward place but I don't think they expected the red flag. Mind you, as annoyed as Russell was, it didn't really matter. It's been a long time since we've seen a mobile barbecue like he had going there for a while. Wow, that engine really let go didn't it?  

Hamilton was always only holding the lead until the DRS was enabled and Verstappen swept by him, making it look all too easy. It shows how much faster that Red Bull is than the Mercedes.

Perez was doing a good recovery drive after that, it got to be fairly mundane after that, I mean there were some good passes on the high speed chicane, Ocon's pass on Piastri was pretty brave there.

What a moment for Verstappen when he went off the track, but he managed to save it! Lucky for him he had that lead over Hamilton or else that could have been where he lost the race entirely.

Norris made a great pass on Hulkenberg, his team didn't seem that thrilled but they should be as he was heading to score the first points of the season for them.

It all went crazy after Magnussen hit the barrier and lost his tyre. That was a big deal and again, instead of a safety car, we had a red flag. With only two laps to go that seemed like an odd choice.

Oh my word, that carnage after the restart was akin to Spa in 1998!! There were just cars and debris everywhere! Sainz was pleading for them not to give him the penalty for taking out Alonso, but from where I was sitting it was his fault. Alonso got lucky when they put the grid back to how it had been for the previous start, but it wasn't great for those who had crashed out! It was especially bad for Alpine, they'd done so well up to that point and for their drivers to crash into one another was just horrible for them.

Ending the race the way they did was a very odd choice, under the safety car with no passing, what was even the point of that? I don't know. It was certainly different and Red Bull and Vertsappen took the win. I'm not saying he didn't deserve it, but it was a very strange ending and I am guessing the Hamilton fans will be out in force saying how unfair it was to their driver again. 

What are the FIA doing? They're making F1 a farce with decisions like the ones today, it's insane.

[Everso Biggyballies]

They certainly need to put the cars in parc ferme when they have a red flag. Allow work to be done after it returns to green / cars are released back onto the track. So at best if you have work, tyres, repairs whatever, you at best join the rear of the grid / line.

As for doing a grid start with 2 or 3 laps is asking for trouble like we saw, with a chunk of the grid wiped out. Just call the race for gods sake. Isnt there a rule that offers full points for a race. called past 75%. Certainly not a grid start at a track like Australia where T1/2 is always a black spot.
If with 10 laps to go they feel the need to restart for the Netflix element, then do a rolling start..

What happened today was an attempt to replicate Abu Dhabi '21.

[Star]

I just think it was insane! I still can't believe they did that. You're right, there is a rule where they could have just ended it without the farce we saw. It can't be good for F1 in my view. Apparently they put the red flag in place after the Albon clash due to gravel on the track, I guess that makes sense, but the second one was ridiculous and don't even get me started on the third one!!

[Aty]

Four weeks to the next race. There will be a lot of head scratching this month, but teams do need a breather, and time to regroup. I am hoping next race will be a better one from the one we saw today.

[P. Cornelius Scipio]

I am lost for words, a sport that depicts itself as super professional ending up giving races like this... a standing start with 2 laps to go is asking for trouble, I am very much in favour of standing starts but there must be a race after that, if you only have 1 or 2 laps it becomes a roulette.

Other than that Verstappen had another great race and I think that it's fair to say that at the 3rd race of the season we have lost any hope not only of a meaningful fight for the WDC among driver from different teams, but we have already lost any hope that Perez could be a credibkle threat to Verstappen (this is not a criticism of Perez).

Hamilton IMHO was outshined once again by his team but got quite lucky. I must say that even though I truly admire Hamilton I think that at times he's so unfair that he borderds on the dangerous: a formation lap cannot be THAT slow, it is dangerous for the cars behind, it is utterly unsporting and Hamilton should have been punished for this behaviour. Pity the only one in F1 who did anything about this dark side of Hamilton's has been good old Vettel a few years back at Baku (slowing down the field before a restart on such a long straight IMHO is criminal)

Russell deserved much more, IMHO he is ready to lead Mercedes

Alonso did well and I think that without all the mess in the last few laps he could have challenged Hamilton

Sainz had a good race and then ruined everything with a rather silly move

Leclerc IMHO wes very optimistic with that move, he should have considered that Stroll might have someone on the inside and keep to the left

[PTRACER]

I am lost for words, a sport that depicts itself as super professional ending up giving races like this... a standing start with 2 laps to go is asking for trouble, I am very much in favour of standing starts but there must be a race after that, if you only have 1 or 2 laps it becomes a roulette.

Agreed, it does make it a roulette. Anything that happened before the red flag is essentially irrelevant. Including Saturday's qualifying.

Sorry but I think they need to go back to rolling starts, unless the red flag is within that first 3 laps of the GP.

[Everso Biggyballies]

This question was asked in the rate the race thread, but I thought it better to answer in the race thread....

Up to date stats on red flags by decade would be interesting.

82 races have been affected by red flags in the history of F1

But we have had 92 total red flags shown (that includes races with multiple reds )

Multiple reds occurred at :

Belgium 1981 had two reds.... #1 was for the start accident when Stohr ran over the Arrows mechanic, the 2nd was lap 54 for rain.
Austria 1987. Restarted twice for opening lap crashes
1990 Belgian GP. Restarted twice for opening lap crashes.
Japan in 2014, the first on lap 2 for torrential rain, the 2nd being due to the tragic Bianchi accident.
Brazil 2016 had 2 reds....#1 for rain and a crash, #2 for rain
Tuscan 2020 had 2....#1 for a crash involving 4 cars, #2 for a single car crash requiring barrier repairs.
Saudi Arabia 2021....#1 for barrier repairs after shumacher crashed, #2 for a multiple car crash

Oh and of course Australia 2023.... #1 for no reason, #2 for no reason and #3 for nonsense reason.

3 is the record for the most number of reds in one race.


15 times races were not restarted

Aborted starts dont classify as red flags. Crashes halted after the start on lap 1 do (ie AGP 1996 when Brundle crashed.)


RACES Affected By Decade (Some races had multiple reds as above)

1950's. Surprisingly one red flag. 1950 Indianapolis. Race stopped on lap 138 due to rain and never restarted

1960's. NIL

1970's. 12 (1975 was the first year we had more than one race red flagged... we had 3)

1980's. 20

1990's. 20

2000's. 6

2010's. 11

2020's. 13.


2021 is the individual year with the most red flagged races: 7

[MonteCristo]

I am lost for words, a sport that depicts itself as super professional ending up giving races like this... a standing start with 2 laps to go is asking for trouble, I am very much in favour of standing starts but there must be a race after that, if you only have 1 or 2 laps it becomes a roulette.

Agreed, it does make it a roulette. Anything that happened before the red flag is essentially irrelevant. Including Saturday's qualifying.

Sorry but I think they need to go back to rolling starts, unless the red flag is within that first 3 laps of the GP.

I have no problem with grid restarts. It is more exiciting.

But in terms of roulette, they need to go to the old aggregate system where times from the previous race segment are taken into account. Eg: Max is 5sec down the road at the time of the previous red flag? He's given 5sec in hand for the restart, and even if Lewis passes him at the restart, he has to gain 5sec to pass him at the end of the race.

That would actually make it more interesting as well. More convoluted, yes. But also more to talk about during the race.

[MonteCristo]

To make it even more Nascary,

A Formula One fan at the Australian Grand Prix suffered a cut to his arm when struck by a piece of debris from Kevin Magnussen’s car, putting the spotlight on organisers’ safety protocols.

Will Sweet said he was standing with his fiancee on a packed hill just off turn two at Albert Park during Sunday’s race when the Danish Haas driver’s car hit the track-side barrier sending his tyre and debris flying into the air.

“It slapped me in the arm and I was just standing there bleeding,” he told radio station 3AW. “My arm was covering where my neck would’ve been, but if that had hit my fiancee, it would’ve got her right in the head.

“I realised how big it was and how heavy it was. Part of it was shredded and really sharp, if it hit me in a different angle, it could’ve been horrendous,” he added

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2023/ ... ourne-race

[Everso Biggyballies]

The usual race stats / facts.... (some of these I mentioned in the preview)

* I think we are all now aware this was the first F1 race in history to feature three red flags.

* The last time a race finished under the Safety Car was at Monza in Italy in 2022.

* It’s the first time ever that Red Bull have won the first three races of an F1 season.

* Max had never previously won the AGP..... Red Bull had only ever won it once previously (Seb in 2011)

* Max is now tied with Senna on 80 career podiums. 7th equal overall. Only Lewis(192), Schumacher (155), Vettel (122), Prost(106), Kimi (103) and Fernando (101) have scored more.

* Talking of Fernando he has now scored 3 consecutive podiums for the first time since 2013 (Belgium Italy and Singapore)

* Until this race Lewis had not completed a single lap in the top four this year.

* There were 3 WDCs with a total of 11 titles on the podium . (Actually, with JYS dishing out trophies at one stage there were 14 titles on the podium ) ....It was the first time 3 WDCs stood on the podium since Hungary 2018 (Lewis Seb and Kimi)

* It was the 37th time since 1950 that 3 existing (ie not including future) WDCs stood on an F1 Championship Grand Prix podium together

* Max and Lewis have now finished one-two (in either order) 34 times, more than any other driver pairing in history.

* It was the first time in the 64 years since Aston Martin ran their first GP that they have finished with two cars in the top 4

* It was the first points for McLaren this year (and both drivers scored). Tsunoda's one point was also the first for Alpha Tauri this year. He had finished the previous 3 races 11th.

* All 10 teams have now scored this year. De Vries and Sargeant are the only two drivers yet to score this yesr

* Albon was 6th on every lap until he crashed out. He ran only one lap as high as 6th the whole of last season.

* CLAP went out on Lap 1 for the fifth time in his F1 career.

* Hulkenberg has now finished seventh in five of his last six starts in Australia.

*.It was George Russell's first mechanical DNF at Mercedes. The only other Merc DNF was Silverstone last year crashing out.

[P. Cornelius Scipio]

I am lost for words, a sport that depicts itself as super professional ending up giving races like this... a standing start with 2 laps to go is asking for trouble, I am very much in favour of standing starts but there must be a race after that, if you only have 1 or 2 laps it becomes a roulette.

Agreed, it does make it a roulette. Anything that happened before the red flag is essentially irrelevant. Including Saturday's qualifying.

Sorry but I think they need to go back to rolling starts, unless the red flag is within that first 3 laps of the GP.

If I remember correctly, until a few years ago after they had covered 75/80% of the race distance a gp could be red flagged and full points still be awareded. they must have changed something recently, I was shocked when they talked of restarting the race with 2 laps to go because I thogught that the old rules still in force.

I understand that they want to cover the full race distance (with possibly all the cars) but then they must carefully consider the consequences and tune the rules accordingly.

They act like geniuses and then they make such basic mistakes but what do you expect from someone like Stefano Domenicali? I mean seriuìously? Look at how he behaves during the pre race show, he probably thinks that he's at the movies, I mean he's the guy famous for always making a mess of things at Ferrari, and they put him in charge of F1???!!! and what is his USP? he wears trainer with a jacket.... it makes me want to cry, when you think at the recemntly departed Mario Forghieri (IMHO one of the greatest characters of F1 and a real genius), Forghieri could wear anything, he obviously didn't care about it, he was thinking about the cars, about the race, about making things work, now instead we have Domenicali who can't think about the cars (he's a got a degree in political science), he can't think about the race (well we know that for a fact given how many mistakes he made while at Ferrari) BUT Domenicali now spemnds a lot of time thinking what he's going to wear when he goes to the races, that's what's important to him, I can't say that I know him well but I grew up not far from where he grew up, he's only a couple of years older than I am, I know many people who worked with him at Ferrari or Lamborghini, by the looks of it if you try to explain to Domenicali what went wrong yesterday with the restart he's probably going to think that his shoes were not matching the colour of his shirt rather than allowing a stading start with only 2 laps to go. Forghieri instead would have understood the problem immediately...

[Star]

To make it even more Nascary,

A Formula One fan at the Australian Grand Prix suffered a cut to his arm when struck by a piece of debris from Kevin Magnussen’s car, putting the spotlight on organisers’ safety protocols.

Will Sweet said he was standing with his fiancee on a packed hill just off turn two at Albert Park during Sunday’s race when the Danish Haas driver’s car hit the track-side barrier sending his tyre and debris flying into the air.

“It slapped me in the arm and I was just standing there bleeding,” he told radio station 3AW. “My arm was covering where my neck would’ve been, but if that had hit my fiancee, it would’ve got her right in the head.

“I realised how big it was and how heavy it was. Part of it was shredded and really sharp, if it hit me in a different angle, it could’ve been horrendous,” he added

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2023/ ... ourne-race

Oh that is nasty, you don't go to a race to get injured do you? I mean we all know the marshalls take a risk but they are trained and if they get hit by debris, well I guess it's a risk of the job that they are aware of. We all know what happened to the poor marshall in Melbourne when he got hit by that wheel, it was a tragic accident, as it was when another marshall died after being hit by a wheel in Monza.

For a fan to be hit by a lump of car like that suggests that they were too close to the track. Now I know you want to be as close as possible but you have to balance that with the risk. The fans won't do that, but the circuit should on their behalf.

If they don't look carefully at this things they could find themselves with a costly lawsuit at some point.

[Michael Ferner]

I am lost for words, a sport that depicts itself as super professional ending up giving races like this... a standing start with 2 laps to go is asking for trouble, I am very much in favour of standing starts but there must be a race after that, if you only have 1 or 2 laps it becomes a roulette.

Agreed, it does make it a roulette. Anything that happened before the red flag is essentially irrelevant. Including Saturday's qualifying.

Sorry but I think they need to go back to rolling starts, unless the red flag is within that first 3 laps of the GP.

I have no problem with grid restarts. It is more exiciting.

But in terms of roulette, they need to go to the old aggregate system where times from the previous race segment are taken into account. Eg: Max is 5sec down the road at the time of the previous red flag? He's given 5sec in hand for the restart, and even if Lewis passes him at the restart, he has to gain 5sec to pass him at the end of the race.

That would actually make it more interesting as well. More convoluted, yes. But also more to talk about during the race.

Oh, no! No! Nooo!!!

Not the darned aggregate times again. That was the most stupid thing ever existed. Races are about position, not about time; it doesn't matter whether you win by one second, two minutes or three hours. Was a time when they routinely held races in two heats, both of the same distance, and instead of establishing a final ranking by points (one for each position, ties decided by second heat result - easy to understand, easy to apply and most of all: fair!) they often aggregated the times, which usually takes hours (well, okay minutes) during which time nobody knows the results, and leads to the most egregious and idiotic scenarios on the track. One of the very few things I don't miss of the past times I witnessed in motor racing!!