F1 news LIVE: Australian Grand Prix build-up as Ferrari expect ‘significant’ power increase

Two years after the Australian Grand Prix was scrapped due to COVID-19 hours before the first practice, Formula One returns Down Under to an upgraded Albert Park and a warm welcome from local fans starved of elite motor sport through the pandemic.

Plenty has changed since Valtteri Bottas won the 2019 race for Mercedes in Melbourne, kicking off another season dominated by former team mate Lewis Hamilton and the Silver Arrows.

In its first upgrade in a quarter of a century, Albert Park has been re-surfaced and had corners removed to encourage passing and hopefully put an end to processional race-days.

Mercedes and Hamilton, meanwhile, have fallen off their perch, leaving Ferrari and Red Bull the talk of the paddock after the season-opening swing through Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.

The Ferrari car’s early strength and the budding rivalry between Charles Leclerc and Red Bull’s world champion Max Verstappen has motor sport pundits raving.

Whether it is renewed interest in the series or just a spell of balmy autumn weather, fans thronged to Albert Park on Thursday and bumper crowds are tipped through the weekend in a city which spent some 260 days locked down through the pandemic.

“The drivers are smiling, fans are smiling and the weather gods are smiling on us,” Australian Grand Prix Corporation boss Andrew Westacott told Reuters.

“It’s a much, much quicker circuit and I expect it’s going to produce great racing on the weekend.”

Many fans will hope that means more duelling between Dutchman Verstappen and fellow 24-year-old Leclerc, whose battles lit up the Middle Eastern double-header.

Verstappen, who had a non-finish at Bahrain but bounced back a winner in Saudi Arabia, said he would prefer to avoid going wheel-to-wheel with Leclerc by driving an improved car.

“For the viewers, it’s good,” he said on Thursday of their rivalry which dates back to their go-karting days.

“Of course I enjoy the battles but I’m also more focused on actually trying to make the car better and to get a better feeling in the car, and then hopefully we don’t need to battle in every single race.”

Verstappen said Red Bull had made “little steps” developing their car since Jeddah but stopped short of tipping a big weekend in Melbourne.

“We’ll do our best but at the moment we don’t know how the car’s going to perform,” he said.

Mercedes might also fall into that camp, having produced a car that bounces, or ‘porpoises’, on the straights as downforce comes and goes.

After Hamilton finished 10th in Jeddah and his new team mate George Russell came fifth, the team are 40 points behind Ferrari, and just one clear of Red Bull who suffered dual retirements in Bahrain.

Team boss Toto Wolff warned there would be no “magic fix” for the W13 car’s troubles in time for Sunday’s race.

“But we’re pushing to steadily bring gains over the upcoming races, to hopefully move us closer to the front of the pack.”

Four-times world champion Sebastian Vettel may be grateful just to be racing, after missing the first two rounds due to a positive COVID-19 test.

The Aston Martin driver’s seat was filled by Nico Hulkenberg but he makes his return in Melbourne, hoping to notch his team’s first points of the season.

Haas have been working around the clock and used one of their curfews to put together Mick Schumacher’s new car, having opted against doing so after his qualifying crash in Saudi Arabia.

Team boss Guenther Steiner explained the “tough” decision for the crew and how any more misfortune in qualifying and practice would mean a single driver on the grid once more.

“Last night we broke the curfew because the guys wanted to get ahead for this morning, so tonight we don’t have to go over it. Breaking one curfew was worthwhile to get to a good point,” he said.

“You need to bring as many parts as you can in the moment. You cannot bring more, there is nothing in stock anymore. All what you’ve got, you bring here.

“But there’s no spare chassis, no safety net here, so they need to be careful. Otherwise we’ll start again with one car!”

However, there’s better news in that Schumacher’s chassis from last time out can be repaired and rejoin the spare parts pool for the team, once it clears customs and makes its way back to base.

Former Haas racer Nikita Mazepin has hit out against sanctions on Russian athletes, but says he will not publicly disclose his views on the situation in Ukraine due to “tremendous risks” of not pleasing everybody.

Mazepin’s father owns the Uralkali firm which was dropped as sponsor by the racing firm, before the driver himself was sacked from the team.

“I don’t agree with being in the sanctions and I have said previously that I intend to fight it,” Mazepin told BBC.

“Perhaps now is not the right time because if you look at the whole situation that is happening against athletes in the general case, it is cancel culture against my country.

“That is about the sanctions.

“My feelings [on the war in Ukraine], they obviously changed as a human being and as a person that wants to live in a very peaceful world.

“But I will be honest with you, I see tremendous risks in saying anything at all about this case because I will never satisfy everyone and therefore, I will keep myself publicly quiet.”

Pirelli’s tyre compounds for this weekend’s race: Hard C2, Medium C3 and Soft C5.

Mario Isola, Pirelli Motorsport Director:

“The circuit layout has been heavily revised to improve overtaking and, as a result, there’s also new asphalt that should be quite smooth. The track is likely to offer very low levels of grip at the start, and conditions could be more variable.

“We decided to opt for the step in the compound nominations, as we noticed that there was a relatively small performance gap between the C3 and C4 compounds during development testing, and we believe that the new Albert Park is a good place to try out this option.”

Sebastian Vettel is hoping to hit the ground running for Aston Martin this weekend, having missed the opening two rounds of the 2022 F1 season through Covid.

He’ll start his campaign this time around in Australia and knows he has to face a steep learning curve after a month out of the car.

“After testing positive and missing the first two races, it feels a bit like arriving late to school, so I’m really keen to get going again,” said Vettel.

“Starting my season in Australia is something I’ve done before, of course, and it’s also great that Formula 1 is returning after a difficult couple of years.

“For me, after nearly a month out of the car, it will be important to learn throughout the practice sessions, and I hope we can take some steps forward in what is usually an exciting and unpredictable race.”

Teammate Lance Stroll is hoping that some upgrades to the track make it an extra fun race.

“Melbourne is such a great sporting city, and the Albert Park track is always fun to drive.

“I’m looking forward to sampling the revised layout and the resurfaced track, which will hopefully improve overtaking – especially into Turn 13, which has been tightened. In fact, it will be very interesting to see how these new ground effect cars perform here, as they should also hopefully make racing closer and more exciting.”

The big target for Carlos Sainz this season is simple: to get his first victory at a Grand Prix.

Ferrari have started the season superbly well and the Spaniard has been on the podium twice, with teammate Charles Leclerc winning in Bahrain.

But as Sainz told BTG podcast, he wants a win of his own this season - as well as having bolder ambitions in future.

“I would like to get a win, and the rest, let’s see,” said Sainz.

“I keep chasing my dream in Formula 1, which is to win the first race obviously, then a championship. But to win a championship, you need to win a race.

“I will keep chasing that; I am not saying it will happen but it’s what I wake up every morning or go to sleep with in my head every day, so I wish it to happen.

“To win a world championship, you need a win and consistent podiums, and over the last few years, I have shown, and I have proved to myself, that every time I had an opportunity to score a podium, I’ve got it.

“I have had the chance to win once or twice, and I’ve nearly made it. So, I am confident; you give me the right car, I think I can be there.”

Sainz’s next opportunity comes in Melbourne this weekend.

Formula One world champion Max Verstappen said he will try to keep his off-track commitments in check and focus on his day job as a racer, wary that his title defence might suffer with too many distractions.

The Dutch Red Bull driver is hot property for media, sponsors and fans after his 2021 triumph, and the relaxation of biosecurity protocols could mean more demands on his time.

“Even if there is no Covid for sure I’m not going to do more... on weekends because I’m there to race, I’m not there to entertain the crowds,” he told a small group of reporters on Thursday at Albert Park ahead of Sunday’s Australian Grand Prix.

“I’ll entertain them by doing that on the track. Otherwise you get upset, you don’t feel good and it’s going to hurt your performance. So you need to just keep it exactly the same, the same approach as other race weekends.”

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Nico Hulkenberg stepped in for Sebastian Vettel for the first two races of the season and it’s fair to say he caught the bug for driving again.

Aston Martin’s reserve driver this season, the German finished 17th and 12th in his two races in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, finishing ahead of fellow AM driver Lance Stroll in the second.

And he’s open to a return on a more permanent basis, though notes it won’t be a quick option.

“Yes, of course, if there is a good opportunity, definitely I’m up for it [a full-time return to F1]. Now having been away and having done Bahrain, the rush of qualifying, the excitement of the race, the battling on Lap 1, there is a lot of great things that happen in Formula 1, and it’s a lot of fun,” he said.

“So, if the right opportunity is there, of course, but that’s not going to be an easy, easy task. I think everyone’s learning curve is very steep with these new cars. There’s lots to learn, you know, and we’ll continue for the months to come.

“I am happy to have helped the team by standing in again and I will remain on standby should I be needed again.”

Lewis Hamilton is braced for more misery in Melbourne after his Mercedes team ruled out any major upgrades for this weekend’s Australian Grand Prix.

Hamilton has already been cast 29 points adrift in the championship race after he finished only 10th at the second round in Saudi Arabia a fortnight ago.

Mercedes have dominated the sport since 2014 – carrying Hamilton to six titles and winning an unprecedented eight constructors’ championships in succession.

But Hamilton and new British team-mate George Russell have all but written off their aspirations unless Mercedes can radically improve their underperforming car.

Mercedes’ season has been derailed by ‘porpoising’ – the phenomenon seen this year when the car violently bounces on its suspension at high speed.

The problem caught Mercedes completely off guard, and Russell said it is the source of 99 per cent of the team’s problems.

It had been suggested that the Silver Arrows would bring a new rear wing and a revised floor to Melbourne for Formula One’s first race Down Under in two years.

But the PA news agency understands that no big updates are planned for Sunday’s race at Albert Park.

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Engineering Director Andrew Shovlin says Mercedes will be taking a “phased” approach to improving the cars for Hamilton and Russell over the coming races, after going “a bit too far” with their fine-tuning before qualifying in Saudi Arabia.

That weekend saw Hamilton shockingly eliminated in Q1, but Shovlin believes that the gap between Mercedes and the midfield gives them “breathing space” to experiment as they try to catch the front-runners.

“We’re under no illusions what that performance gap is, and in Jeddah, it was ultimately a bit bigger than in Bahrain,” he said.

“We’ve got quite a lot to find both in qualifying and on long run if we want to challenge the Ferrari and the Red Bull cars. However, behind us it looks like we have a bit of margin to that midfield.

“We need to do a good job to be ahead of them, but we have a bit of margin and that buys us a bit of breathing space to allow us to experiment on the weekends, to try and bring solutions to lift the level of performance of the car. Everyone is working very hard to try and understand the issue and bring solutions and we are going to be doing that in a phased way over the next few races.”