It was a great day to be trackside to see new machinery up close and personal for the 2019 FIA Formula 1 World Championship season on the streets of Albert Park, we take a look at how the first two practice seasons of the year unfolded starting with Free Practice One, which was a great start for Mercedes and Lewis Hamilton.

 

 

FP1: Hamilton heads the two Ferraris.

 

Lewis Hamilton topped the morning session at the Formula 1 2019 Rolex Australian Grand Prix, but it was the two Ferrari’s that were not too far behind.

 

Hamilton warned of a deficit to the Scuderia in pre-season testing, but the Briton began FP1 as if it was business as usual.

 

The reigning World Champion posted the benchmark of a 1:23.599 and was 0.038 seconds clear of Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel with Charles Leclerc a further 0.074 behind in his first official session for the prancing horse.

 

Max Verstappen gave Red Bull and it’s new partnership with Honda a promising start to their new era together by setting the fourth best time and 0.193 off Hamilton’s effort.

 

The Silver Arrows spent the majority of the hour and a half opening practice session at the top of the time-sheets as Valtteri Bottas became the first front-runner to post a quick time before Hamilton jumped his Finnish team-mate on the leader-board before swapping mediums for softs.

 

Bottas’ run on the softer compound left him 0.267 seconds adrift of Hamilton and left him fifth fastest, but things could have ended nasty with a close call down the run-off area at the penultimate corner.

 

The Finn clipped the grass on the outside and went straight into the escape road, having a brief lock-up and then performing a quick spin and just avoided the barrier as his W10 swung around.

 

Red Bull’s Pierre Gasly could not match his team-mate Verstappen in his first official practice run for the Milton Keynes-squad as the Frenchman was 1.333 seconds off the pace in eighth.

 

This allowed Alfa Romeo Racing’s Kimi Raikkonen to take the best of the rest spot in sixth place, a great boost for the Swiss-based Italian outfit.

 

Raikkonen was 1.217 seconds off of Hamilton’s benchmark, providing an indicator that the midfield runners are not close to the big three than they’ve ever been before.

 

The aforementioned Gasly’s lack of pace in the opening practice session meant he also was behind his former team Toro Rosso, and the driver he replaced in the Red Bull junior team Daniil Kvyat..

 

The Russian returned to the Faenza team, after a spell as Ferrari’s development driver, posted the seventh best time of FP1 and was only two-hundredths off of Raikkonen’s time.

 

Kvyat’s new team-mate Alexander Albon suffered a tough start on Formula One weekend debut, setting the 13th best effort but caused a red flag when the nose of his Honda-powered STR14 hit the barriers at the exit of turn one in the remaining thirty minutes.

 

Haas F1 Team’s Kevin Magnussen was ninth quickest and ahead of Renault’s Nico Hulkenberg completing the top ten with the latter losing time earlier on due to an electronics issue.

 

The other Alfa Romeo Racing C38 of Antonio Giovinazzi ended the first practice session in 11th place and in-front of the other Haas VF-19 of Romain Grosjean who was 12th and the aforementioned Albon who took 13th.

 

Carlos Sainz was 14th quickest in FP1 for McLaren and ahead of the two SportPesa Racing Point RP19’s of Lance Stroll and Sergio Perez who were 15th and 16th respectively.

 

Home favourite Daniel Ricciardo finished a lowly 17th in his first official practice outing for Renault and in-front of the other McLaren of Lando Norris who was 18th and the two Williams of Robert Kubica and George Russell who brought up the rear.

 

FP2: Hamilton leads Bottas in Mercedes one-two

 

 

Reigning World Champion Lewis Hamilton ended the day as he started it, on top of the leader-board in the second practice session at the Formula 1 2019 Rolex Australian Grand Prix leading a Mercedes one-two.

 

Hamilton running the soft Pirelli rubber, edged team-mate Bottas by 0.048 seconds with his benchmark set just at the halfway point of the one hour and a half long session.

 

The Briton’s pace advantage was so great that his time-sheet topper on Pirelli’s medium compounds in the earlier stages of FP2 was enough to ensure first place.

 

Max Verstappen planted his RB15 Honda-powered Red Bull to third and eighth tenths off of Hamilton’s benchmark, after opting to undertake his performance run near the closing stages of the session.

 

The Dutchman set his time with 15 minutes remaining after spending the majority of time running the medium compounds more than everyone in the field, before finishing ahead of new team-mate Pierre Gasly by just 0.042 seconds.

 

Pre-season favourites Ferrari had a low-key FP2 session, showing promising pace on the medium tyres with Sebastian Vettel complaining of a problem over the team radio that something was wrong at the first and fourth corners.

 

Vettel put on a set of softs later on and posted a 1:23.473 to complete the top five, describing his SF90 racer as a “bit wobbly”.

 

Vettel’s former team-mate Kimi Raikkonen was sixth fastest for Alfa Romeo and in-front of both R.S.19 Renault’s of Nico Hulkenberg and Daniel Ricciardo who were seventh and eighth respectively.

 

The other Ferrari SF90 of Charles Leclerc ended his day in ninth place and 1.154 seconds off of Hamilton’s benchmark and Haas F1 Team’s Romain Grosjean completed the top ten.

 

Leclerc also suffered a spin later in the session after losing it on the exit kerb of the turn four left hand corner, but the young Monegasque driver was able to continue on.

 

Toro Rosso’s Daniil Kvyat occupied 11th place and ahead of the second Ferrari VF-19 powered Haas of Kevin Magnussen who took 12th and Racing Point’s Lance Stroll who was 13th.

 

McLaren’s Carlos Sainz also left his performance run late, setting the 14th best time and just ahead of Alfa Romeo’s Antonio Giovinazzi – who took a late spin at the penultimate corner touching the grass.

 

SportPesa Racing Point’s Sergio Perez was 16th and in-front of the second Toro Rosso of Alexander Albon who was a lowly 17th with the latter following up from his earlier FP1 crash with an excursion through the gravel trap later on and a similar spin to Giovinazzi’s.

 

The other McLaren of Lando Norris was 18th on the time-sheets and ahead of both Williams of George Russell and Robert Kubica who finished at the rear.