The Formula One season roared into life properly down under in Melbourne as the Friday practice sessions got under way. For F1 fans there is plenty of intrigue to follow this year given the number of driver moves since the end of last season.

Carlos Sainz is now at a resurgent Williams who many F1 analysts believed were the fifth quickest team in testing. As the day evolved in the Australian sun it became quickly evident the Spaniard was quickly up to pace as he and team mate Alex Albon finished the second session just outside the top ten and with identical lap times.

The Racing Bulls were to challenge the Williams claim to be the best of the rest with Yuki Tsunoda in P4 and his rookie team mate Isaac Hadjar two spots further back behind the Ferrari of Lewis Hamilton.

 

 

 

Hamilton off the pace of Leclerc

All eyes were on the seven times world champion as he pulled out of the Ferrari garage for the first time. Ironically he lined up behind arch rival Max Verstappen in the pit lane, but gave him a wide birth given the Red Bull was plastered with Flo Viz paint which would have made a mess of the scarlet livery.

In practice one Lewis finished the session over half a second behind his team mate Charles Leclerc, and while in FP2 the gap was down to 0.4 seconds with the Monegasque heading the session, Hamilton suggested afterwards he is still finding his way with the new car.

“Honestly, the car felt so much different to what I’ve ever experienced coming to this track,” explained Hamilton. “So, it took a little bit of bedding in through FP1. FP2 is definitely a little better but just building. But we’re slowly building and getting a little bit faster bit by bit.”

Carlos Sainz explained following his move to Williams that the biggest difference for him was getting used to a different power unit. The Spaniard who has driven for Toro Rosso, Renault, McLaren and Ferrari believes for any driver this is always the biggest challenge when moving F1 teams. Yet Lewis Hamilton gave a surprise answer when asked what he meant about the differences he was feeling at his first visit to Melbourne in a Ferrari.

Last minute regulation U-Turn for Australian Grand Prix

 

 

 

Lewis admits ‘adjusting’ his driving style

“Its just different. Just a lot different. But the car doesn’t feel bad or anything. It just requires a different way of driving. So, [I’m] adjusting my driving style bit by bit, but enjoying driving.”

Hamilton has struggled since the new ground effect F1 cars were introduced in 2022 and from day one since arriving in Maranello, Ferrari have been working with the British driver on making adjustments to his driving style. It was noticeable when Lewis was testing the previous year Ferrari’s, he had a number of lock ups under braking together with a visit into the barriers in Fiorano.

Why Mercedes didn’t do any work on helping Lewis adapt his driving style with the new ground effect cars is unknown. It could be Hamilton was such a legend within the team that suggesting he needed to change his winning formula of a driving style was a bridge too far for anyone to cross. Yet Lewis is now admitting he must make modifications, but to suggest its Ferrari specific might be a little disingenuous.

Lewis is definitely looking to adapt the way he takes the corners yet the differences between him and Charles Leclerc remain obvious. With medium and high speed corners the aerodynamics is dominant and so the drivers very much approach these turns in a similar fashion. Its in the slower speed turns where the driving differences becomes evident.

Aston Martin ‘disguised’ their pace in testing

 

 

 

Late braking hard unsettles ground effect cars

Each of the drivers are trying to make the car rotate as quickly as possible whilst under control to achieve the fastest way around the turn. Rotation is the phase after the initial turning input and the F1 drivers handle this in very different ways.

Lewis Hamilton hustles his cars along and handles the rotation phase in the style of Ayrton Senna. He brakes late on the theoretical perfect line and gets a lot of initial turn in then handles any under/oversteer with lots of small inputs into the steering wheel  – which is aggressive and asks a lot of the rear tyres.

So in terms of F1 car design, Lewis would be continually asking the team for more rear downforce to keep the aero balance towards the rear.

However, the new ground effect F1 cars with their huge aerodynamic effects being created underneath the floor of the car – utilise the shifting of the centre of pressure to make the cars ‘stick’ to the asphalt. This makes the rear end go light at times in the cornering phases, something that Lewis just doesn’t like. 

Mystery of Verstappen’s silence

 

 

 

Leclerc has a smoother driving style

Hamilton misdiagnosed this feeling when at Mercedes by criticising  his design engineers for pushing forward the position of the cockpit  on the cars. Yet proper analysis revealed the differences between there Red Bull and the Mercedes cockpit positions were minuscule. 

Lewis’ new team mate handles the slow speed corners in a very different fashion. Charles Lelcerc is earlier and softer on the brakes and introduces less rotation on the corner entry and relies on the understeering nature of the car to do the rest.

By mid-corner, Leclerc’s car is very stable despite the understeer setup, this allows him to carry more speed. Braking earlier but less hard and carrying more speed into the turn means Leclerc will have a higher minimum speed than his team mate. His style looks a lot more calm than Hamilton’s.

Marko admits issue with Red Bull car

 

 

 

Final practice to confirm the pecking order

Its difficult to see how Hamilton can change his way of attacking the slower corners, having raced with this ‘go kart’ style for his entire career. Formula One went through an era where the car design saw them on rails, something Hamilton excelled with. Now the rear end is inherently less stable, Lewis has lost the advantage he had over other more ‘normal’ driving styles.

“Honestly, we did good preparation work because the feeling with the car was good,” Leclerc said of his two practice sessions in Melbourne. “There’s obviously things that we need to improve as always and I’m not very happy with the balance yet, but we are in a much better place compared to Bahrain testing. There’s still some performance to find, but that’s the same for everybody in the paddock.

“Those cars are pretty new for everyone. So you’ve got to push it to understand where exactly the limit is. But it’s been a solid first day. Now we’ve got to wait and see how it goes tomorrow when we push a bit more.”

The teams and the drivers have just one more practice session before qualifying comes around and only then will we know whether Ferrari have a hope of living with the pace of the McLaren’s, and whether Lewis can get closer to his team mate.

Hidden data: Hamilton is fast?

 

 

 

 

Marko rages against ‘crippling’ mid-season rule change

Marko slams FIA’s mid-season rule change: “It’s madness!” – Helmut Marko is never one to mince words, and his frustration at the FIA’s latest decision regarding front wing flexibility is no exception. The Red Bull motorsport advisor is furious over the governing body’s plan to introduce stricter stress tests for Formula 1 car front wings in the middle of the season.

Marko believes that if a rule change is necessary, it should be introduced at the start of the season, rather than upsetting teams’ strategies after they have already designed their cars to meet the existing guidelines. Speaking to Auto Motor und Sport, he didn’t hold back: “Either the new rule applies from the start of the season or not at all.”

The FIA’s move is aimed at curbing the use of flexible wings, an issue that has long been a source of controversy in the sport. But Marko believes the decision is both unfair and impractical….READ MORE