The Australian GP was full of surprises, from Verstappen retiring to Sainz winning and to Russell’s last lap crash.

Ferrari had a very smooth operation in Australia. Sainz over took Verstappen on lap two to take the lead of the race. Leclerc finished second making it Ferrari’s first 1, 2 since Bahrain 2022. So far Ferrari is looking to be Red Bull’s closest competitor this year.

Red Bull had one of their worst races, if not their worst, in the last two years (excluding Singapore 2023). Verstappen, who had not been particularly pleased with the car all weekend, retired on lap 5 out of 58 due to a brake problem. He was trying to win his tenth race in a row, which he has done before once in 2023. Funny enough Verstappen hadn’t retired from a race since the 2022 Australian Grand Prix. Perez also had a bad race compared to the first two races of 2024, he finished fifth behind both of the Ferrari and Mclaren cars.

Mercedes had a terrible weekend, with a double DNF. Hamilton, who hasn’t been very comfortable in the car all season, had an engine issue and retired on lap 17. Russell at least looked like he was going to get a decent seventh but then on the last lap crashed. The stewards blamed this crash on Alonso, who was right in front of Russell, even though they didn’t touch. The reason being is Alonso was defending from Russell and tried a new technique in corner six on the last lap. He braked very early closing the gap to Russell and causing Russell to lose down force all of the sudden. Losing down force caused Russell’s car to crash.

Williams was down to one car in Australia due to the fact that Albon crashed in FP1 and they didn’t have a spare chassis. Williams made a hard call to put Albon in Sargeant’s car as they then only had one car. They thought it was the best possibility to score a point or two. Unfortunately for them they didn’t score any points and probably should have just left Sargeant in the car.

It was a crazy weekend with a smooth operator Sainz, a bad strategic call from Williams, and a terrible weekend for Red Bull and Mercedes. And I can’t wait to see what surprises the Japanese GP will bring next weekend.

After the first two races of the season people are wondering who is looking good and who looks like they have some problems to fix.

Red Bull yet again looks to be leading the field by a lot. Verstappen seems to be ahead by quite a bit. He has won both races this season by over a twelve second gap to Perez (second place) both races. It appears that Perez has stepped up his game from last season, with two second places in the two first races. Last time Perez got second before this season was the 2023 Italian Grand Prix. Perez has had a good start to the season, but the big question is can he keep up the good work.

Ferrari looks to be Red Bull’s closest competitor but is still not very close to them. They are the only team aside from Red Bull to have finished on the podium. We have only got to see Sainz race once as he couldn’t compete in Saudi Arabia due to appendicitis. Though he did look pretty good in Bahrain finishing third ahead of his teammate Leclerc. Leclerc finished third in Saudi Arabia and is also looking pretty fast but he doesn’t look as fast as Sainz.

Third in the pack is probably Mclaren who has had a decent season so far, at least it is much better than last year’s start. Mclaren was probably wishing for a little more this year since they were consistently scoring podiums after their upgrades last year. Though it’ll be interesting to see if their updates are as good as they seemed to be last season.

Mercedes has had a disappointing start to the season to say the least. After the season ended last year they thought that might have found a way to make their car faster but it hasn’t seemed to work. Mercedes said they were going to try some new stuff in Australia, if it will help though I’m not sure. Another hot topic around Mercedes is Hamilton going to Ferrari at the end of the season. The big questions are who will be Russel’s teammate in 2025 and can Mercedes solve their problem with the W15?

Aston Martin is doing okay but was probably hoping for a little better after how well they started the 2023 season. Stroll needs to pick up the pace and close the gap to Alonso. Though Stroll probably isn’t going anywhere due to his dad owning the team, he still needs to up his game. Aston Martin could definitely have a chance to pass Mercedes in the standings if Stroll starts performing better. Alonso is doing great at Aston Martin and in the car.