Sainz Takes Victory Down Under

Yesterday, Max Verstappen qualified P1 and lined up next to his former teammate Carlos Sainz on the front row. There were a mix of strategies in terms of starting tyre compounds up and down the grid.

Only 19 drivers started the race. In Free Practice 1, Alex Albon crashed, and it was revealed by the Williams team that he would drive Logan Sargeant’s car for the remainder of the weekend.

Verstappen (along with every other driver for that matter) got off to a good start but was soon reporting issues from behind the wheel of his RB20.

Going through Lap 2, Verstappen was compromised by these issues, and that left the door open for a gunning Sainz who is trying to prove his talent in a bid to get a seat next year. The Spaniard was able to make a move for the lead and swooped past Verstappen at Turn 9.

The rest of the field stayed relatively the same, with all the drivers making it through the first lap safely. However, we heard Verstappen becoming more vocal about his problems in the cockpit. Going into Lap 3, he came on the radio saying, “I just lost the car, really weird.” That wasn’t the end of the radio messages, with him coming back on and telling his race engineer, Gianpiero Lambiase, “the car is loose” – complaining about oversteer.

But then disaster struck for Verstappen. Going down the pit straight into Turn 1 on Lap 4, smoke began to appear from his car. The smoke continued to come out from the back during the lap, and it was clear a problem was in sight. It was suggested it was an engine problem, but it turned out to be the rear right brake. Verstappen started to slow, and it was the end of the race for him in Australia.

After making it back to the pits, Verstappen jumped out of the car, and images showed the rear right brake on fire, melting that side of the car and its tyre. Verstappen’s win streak of 9 came to an end. This was Red Bull’s first mechanical retirement in two years (the last one being Australia 2022).

Meanwhile, out in the lead, Sainz built the gap to his former teammate, Lando Norris who was followed by Charles Leclerc and Oscar Piastri.

With the lap count not even hitting double figures, the three drivers who started on soft compound tyres pitted. Lewis Hamilton, Daniel Ricciardo and Zhou Guanyu all put on the hard tyres. George Russell was the first to ditch the mediums for hards.

It wasn’t long until Leclerc undercut Norris to make it a provisional Ferrari one-two. Sainz led a double podium for Ferrari – their first since the 2022 opener in Bahrain.

Oscar Piastri also got ahead of Norris after the pit-stops, but a strategy call by the McLaren team later in the race meant the cars were swapped, and Norris was released to try and catch the two very speedy Ferrari’s (which ultimately didn’t happen).

At the end of Lap 16, Sainz pitted from the lead to put on the white-walled tyres, returning to the track a few seconds behind Alonso who still needed to box.

It was then that Hamilton reported an engine failure. He came to a stop at the side of the track which bought out a Virtual Safety Car. This played into the hands of Alonso who was able to gain a ‘cheap’ stop – coming out on mediums in P5. Green flag conditions were resumed allowing Sainz to continue his charge from P1.

Haas played the team game a couple of weeks ago in Saudi Arabia, and they tried to replicate that this week too. Hülkenberg was given the go ahead to pass Kevin Magnussen for P11.

The second round of pit stops began to occur. Piastri used his fresh rubber to clear Alonso for P4 at the exit of Turn 11. He was now 9 seconds behind Norris.

As the pit-lane was full of action, Sainz led Leclerc by around 5 seconds, with Norris 4 seconds further back in P3.

Russell pitted with just over 10 laps remaining. With the fresher tyres, he closed in rapidly on Alonso and tried to take sixth place from the Spaniard.

Unfortunately for Russell, his last lap push was too much behind the dirty air of the Aston Martin, and he went into the barriers – leaving his stranded in the middle of the track on the racing line.

Russell frantically called for a red flag to be put out to slow all the remaining cars down. The second VSC of the race was shown and the race finished under these conditions. Russell got out of the car and was okay.

Carlos Sainz crossed the line in P1, followed by Leclerc and Norris. The Spaniard made it the first non-Red Bull win of 2024. For someone who doesn’t have a seat for next year, Sainz is definitely proving his worth as a well-rounded and experienced racing driver!

Post-race drama saw Fernando Alonso receive a 20 second penalty (which was added to his race time) as the stewards deemed his driving before Russell’s crash contributed to the accident.

The final classification of the Australian 2024 Grand Prix is as follows:

Sainz (Driver of the Day)

Leclerc (Fastest Lap)

Norris

Piastri

Perez

Stroll

Tsunoda

Alonso

Hülkenberg

Magnussen

Albon

Ricciardo

Gasly

Bottas

Zhou

Ocon

Russell (DNF)

Hamilton (DNF)

Verstappen (DNF)

Sargeant (DNS)

After his third career race win, Carlos Sainz said: “It was a really good race; I felt really good out there. Of course, a bit stiff, especially physically, it wasn’t the easiest, but I was lucky that I was more or less on my own and I could manage my pace, manage the tyres, manage everything. It wasn’t the toughest race of all, but yeah, very happy, very proud of the team.

“I’m happy to be in a one-two with Charles here. It shows that hard work pays off. Life sometimes is crazy, what happened at beginning of year, then the podium in Bahrain, then the appendix, the comeback, the win... it’s a rollercoaster but I loved it and I’m extremely happy.”

In two weeks’ time, F1 returns to Suzuka for the Japanese Grand Prix. Last year, Verstappen took victory, followed by the two papaya drivers. Will Max be back to being dominant, or will someone else take victory?