Australian Grand Prix Round Up

With Lewis Hamilton the bookies and pundits favourite for the 2014 Drivers World Championship, it was in fact his Mercedes team-mate Nico Rosberg who took the win in Australia on a day that would see Hamilton and World Champion Sebastian Vettel struggle in the season opener.

It was a dominant day in the office for Rosberg as he led the race from lights out to chequered flag.

Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo crossed the line in second, a huge 27 seconds behind the race winner, but was later disqualified for a fuel-flow rate infringement.

The decision promoted rookie Kevin Magnussen, of McLaren, to second.

He crossed the line ahead of McLaren team-mate Jenson Button in third, with Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso fourth, Williams’ Valtteri Bottas fifth and Nico Hulkenburg sixth.

On a day of high drama, the man on pole position Lewis Hamilton had a cylinder failure before the race had even started. As the lights went out he found himself swamped by the cars around him resulting in him entering the first corner in 4th.

Nico Rosberg made a perfect start to find himself leading the race with the pack tightly bunched behind him.

The first corner proved to be the end of the race for Massa and Kobayashi, with the latter locking his brakes hard on the straight and colliding with the back of Massa's Williams.

Hamilton dropped to fifth by the end of the first lap and soon had the Mercedes team on the radio calling for him to “box”.

World champion Sebastian Vettel also had major problems. After a disastrous qualifying he started the Grand Prix in 12th. As the race got underway he started to slip backwards with what seemed to be a power failure to his Red Bull. He was soon on the team radio declaring that they “Do something”. A matter of laps later Vettel along with Hamilton retired from the race.

The retirements of two of the biggest names in the field left opportunities for others to steal the headlines. With Rosberg increasing his lead lap after lap, it was left to young guns like Bottas and Kvyat to provide the entertainment.

Bottas who started in 15th on the grid due to a 5 place penalty soon took advantage of what clearly is one of the best Williams packages we have seen since the mid 90s. He made his way through the field lap after lap with some great overtaking, and would have undoubtedly been in with a shout of a podium had he not scrapped the wall on the exit of turn 10 costing him his back right tyre and bringing out the first safety car of the season.

As the safety car was deployed Jenson Button made a drastic last decision dive into the pits which most certainly changed the outcome of his race. After starting the race in 10th, Button found himself in a position to really challenge for the podium.
Lotus found the going tough for their new car with both drivers retiring towards the last quarter of the race, but at least they got some much needed track time.

The Force India of Nico Hulkenberg ran fourth for most of the race but the pace of Bottas and the Ferrari of Alonso were too much for him in the closing stages as he finished up in 7th ahead of Kimi Raikkonens Ferrari.

As the conclusion of the race drew closer it was clear that Rosberg was untouchable bar a Mercedes failure which never looked like happening. He took the chequered flag to claim the win and get Mercedes off to the perfect start in 2014. This result gave us a winner of a race other than Vettel for the first time since July of last year.

Magnussen who went about his business perfectly from the start was within a second of the Red Bull a matter of laps remaining but Ricciardo was able to hold on to the end.

Bottas who had dropped back to 16th place due to his collision with the wall fought back up the field to finish an impressive 6th.

The Toro Rossos of Jean-Eric Vergne and rookie Daniil Kvyat took 9th and 10th places. Kvyat replaces Vettel as the youngest point's scorer in F1 history at 19 years 10 months.

With Ricciardo and Red Bull being disqualified, everyone from 3rd down moved up a place giving Kevin Magnussen the highest place finish by a rookie driver on his debut since Jaques Villeneuve in 1996. Jenson Button claimed the last place on the podium on what was sure to be an emotional day for him.

Following the disqualifying of Ricciardo, Red Bull issued the following statement

“Following the decision of the FIA that Infiniti Red Bull Racing is in breach of Article 3.2 of the FIA Formula One Sporting Regulations and Article 5.1.4 of the FIA Formula One Technical Regulations with Car 3, the Team has notified the FIA of its intention to appeal with immediate effect.

Inconsistencies with the FIA fuel flow meter have been prevalent all weekend up and down the pit lane. The Team and Renault are confident the fuel supplied to the engine is in full compliance with the regulations.”

Australian Grand Prix 2014 Final Race results;

1) Rosberg
2) Magnussen
3) Button
4) Alonso
5) Bottas
6) Hulkenberg
7) Raikkonen
8) Vergne
9) Kvyat
10) Perez
11) Sutil
12) Gutierrez
13) Chilton
14) Bianchi

Ricciardo (DQ)

DNF; Grosjean, Maldonado, Ericsson, Vettel, Hamilton, Massa and Kobayashi

Reporting by Ben Stevens @BenStevens23