@CharlesLeclerc storms to dominant #AustralianGP victory as @Max33Verstappen retires. #F1 #AusGP

Leclerc Australian GP victory – Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc produced a flawless drive to claim a dominant victory at the Australian GP as title-rival Max Verstappen retired on lap 39.

 

 

The Monegasque-youngster lead throughout the majority of the race, which was interrupted by two safety cars – after which Leclerc dropped Verstappen on both occasions, despite coming under intense pressure in the second restart.

 

Red Bull’s Sergio Perez finished in second place and ahead of Mercedes’ George Russell, who gained big under the safety car, but had to hold off a fast-charging team-mate of Lewis Hamilton to the chequered flag.

 

When the 58-lap Australian GP began, Verstappen looked to have a slightly better start than pole-sitter Leclerc, but the latter was able to sweep across his rival and defend the inside line into the opening corner, where behind Hamilton jumped in-front of Perez, who was following team-mate Verstappen’s line into the inside.

 

Leclerc moved to a 0.6 second gap by the end of the opening tour, with the top two switching quick sectors before the early proceedings was stabilised by the first deployment of the safety car.

 

Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz started on the C2 white side-walled harder compounds but got a poor run off the line from ninth and fell down the field, with the Spaniard starting to fight back on the second lap when he lost the rear of his F1-75 racer after overtaking Haas F1 Team’s Mick Schumacher into the rapid left turn nine kink.

 

Sainz’s correction sent him across the grass on the inside and spun on it’s slippery surface, shooting sideways back across the circuit at the turn ten exit – just in-front of Alfa Romeo F1 Team ORLEN’s Zhou Guanyu – and ended up beached into the gravel trap on the far side.

 

The virtual safety car was briefly deployed before the full safety car was sent out, which remained out until the beginning of lap seven where Leclerc was easily able to maintain his lead over Verstappen despite his F1-75 porpoising heavily on a full tank at the end of each straight.

 

The front-two breezed clear of Hamilton and Perez – the only drivers able to run in the 1:23’s, with Leclerc gaining enough tenths in each sector of the two tours that followed the race going green to be out of a DRS threat from Verstappen by the time the system was re-activated.

 

The Ferrari driver continued to post a string of fastest laps, into the 1:23.3 range and reached a lead of almost two seconds by the 11^th tour.

 

This was increased to three seconds at the end of the next lap as Verstappen suffered a lock-up at turn 13 as he pushed, but dropped a second, then complained that his C3 mediums were heavily worn.

 

Verstappen’s tyre trouble meant he slipped back into the 1:24’s bracket and with Leclerc able to keep his speed high, the Ferrari’s gap increased to six seconds.

 

It hit 8.3 seconds when Red Bull brought Verstappen in for a fresh set of hards on the 18^th lap, which left Leclerc, leading by a comfortable gap ahead of Perez, who had re-overtook Hamilton shortly after the safety car was called in.

 

Ferrari left Leclerc out until the 22^nd tour to swap his mediums for hards – the same lap Mercedes brought in Hamilton and got him out in-front of Perez.

 

But a trickly warm-up lap on the C2 rubber meant the Red Bull could close in at the fast-sweeping turn nine and shoot in-front just before the quick-left and just before the race was stabilised once again due to the second deployment of the safety car.

 

This was because Aston Martin’s Sebastian Vettel’s horror run at Albert Park ended in the barriers ahead of the rapid, tight right hander of turn five – the four-time world champion lost the rear of his AMR22 racer hitting the exit kerb of the previous left and darted into the wall on the inside of the circuit.

 

With Vettel needing to be moved from the short straight between turns five and six, and debris scattered, which had to be cleared from ahead of the former, the safety car remained out until the 27^th tour, with Leclerc’s gap down to 6.9 seconds thanks to Verstappen’s solid pace on the harder tyre after his pit-stop – totally wiped out.

 

When the race went green a second time, Leclerc’s run was compromised by running wide and Verstappen was able to close in on the Ferrari and get alongside on the rundown to turn one.

 

But the Monegasque-youngster was able to remain ahead with solid defending on the inside, which he repeated on the next straight and maintained the lead despite being pressured.

 

Leclerc was then out to rebuild his gap to the Dutchman – again moving clear from the Red Bull with ease, reaching a gap of 3.4 seconds by the end of the 31^st tour, the two leaders reaching the 1:22’s bracket having spent the early proceedings after the safety car in the 1:23’s and 1:24’s respectively as they worked to maintain the tyre’s critical life.

 

Like in the initial stint, Leclerc posted a series of fastest laps as he pulled clear of Verstappen, his lead was above five seconds by the end of the 35^th tour.

 

The lead looked to continue to grow – especially when Leclerc responded to Verstappen’s lap 37 fastest lap with an even better one on the following tour – when Verstappen suddenly retired on the inside of the second corner on the 39^th lap.

 

Smoke coming out of the RB18’s airbox suggested an engine problem was the cause, with the car recovered by the virtual safety car deployment and so Leclerc’s lead over Perez was maintained.

 

Leclerc crossed the line to clinch the Australian GP victory and extending his championship lead to 34 points, still with a solid 1:21 pace for the rest of the race, to win by 20.524 seconds – taking the fastest lap bonus point honours with a 1:20.260 on the final tour, where he also had to deal with traffic.

 

Perez finished clear in second place, with Russell completing the podium after he was able to pit during the Vettel safety car period and emerge just ahead of Alpine’s Fernando Alonso – who was yet to stop after starting on the C2 harder rubber – Perez and Hamilton.

 

After Alonso dropped due to his older tyres, Perez chased down Russell and pushed him for a few laps before passing with DRS assistance on the outside line to turn 11 – the Briton not fighting hard, possibly due to Mercedes warning that “tyre management was more important than track position.”

 

This looked to have cost Russell the podium, but Verstappen’s retirement put him back into third and finished ahead of team-mate Hamilton who was fourth.

 

McLaren’s Lando Norris and Daniel Ricciardo came home in fifth and sixth places respectively with Alpine F1 Team’s Esteban Ocon taking seventh.

 

Alfa Romeo F1 Team ORLEN’s Valtteri Bottas overtook AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly late on when the AT03 racer locked-up and went off at turn 13 – the pairing ending up in an entertaining battle with Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll and Alonso once the double world champion had stopped in the closing stages of the Grand Prix.

 

Williams Racing’s Alexander Albon scored his first point for the Grove-based squad after doing an impressive 57 laps on the harder compounds, running in-front of Ocon for a long period after the second safety car and gained as the fight behind became intense, which meant the Thai-Briton driver could stop very late and not slip outside the top ten.

 

Alfa Romeo’s Zhou ended the Australian Grand Prix in 11^th place and ahead of Stroll who was 12^th – with the Canadian slapped with a 5-second penalty for aggressively weaving in defence against Bottas – the Aston Martin gaining twice after pitting under the initial safety car and completing a two-stop strategy to get there amongst his rivals that started in-front before falling back.

 

The Haas F1 Team pairing followed with Schumacher and Kevin Magnussen taking 13^th and 14^th respectively as AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda came 15^th in the classification.

 

Williams Racing’s Nicholas Latifi wound up 16^th, ahead of Alonso who was the last finisher after his strategy backfired when he suffered severe tyre degradation late on and fell down the order to finish 17^th.

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2022 Australian GP – The Top Three

 

 

2022 Australian GP Winner – Charles Leclerc, #16, Scuderia Ferrari, F1-75:

“What a car today. This weekend, race pace, we were extremely strong, the tyres felt great. I’m just so happy. Incredible to win here. We are only at the third race, so it is difficult to think about the championship, but we have a very strong car, a reliable one too. It’s great to be back in this position.”

 

2^nd Place – Sergio Perez, #11, Oracle Red Bull Racing-RBPT, RB18:

“The start was a bit tricky; Lewis overtook me, he braked late and had a good Turn 1. My first stint was poor with degradation but the hard, the Safety Car – we were unlucky, and we lost Max.”

 

3^rd Place – George Russell, #63, Mercedes AMG Petronas Formula One Team, F1 W13 E Performance:

“We got a little bit lucky today twice, but we’ll take it. There’s so much hard work going on to get us back. We are never going to give up, we were a long way behind and yet here we are, on the podium. If anyone can, Mercedes can.”

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Formula 1 Heineken Australian Grand Prix Race Results Classification (58 Laps)

 

POS	NO	DRIVER	CAR	LAPS	TIME/RETIRED	PTS
1	16	Charles Leclerc	FERRARI	58	1:27:46.548	26
2	11	Sergio Perez	RED BULL RACING RBPT	58	+20.524s	18
3	63	George Russell	MERCEDES	58	+25.593s	15
4	44	Lewis Hamilton	MERCEDES	58	+28.543s	12
5	4	Lando Norris	MCLAREN MERCEDES	58	+53.303s	10
6	3	Daniel Ricciardo	MCLAREN MERCEDES	58	+53.737s	8
7	31	Esteban Ocon	ALPINE RENAULT	58	+61.683s	6
8	77	Valtteri Bottas	ALFA ROMEO FERRARI	58	+68.439s	4
9	10	Pierre Gasly	ALPHATAURI RBPT	58	+76.221s	2
10	23	Alexander Albon	WILLIAMS MERCEDES	58	+79.382s	1
11	24	Zhou Guanyu	ALFA ROMEO FERRARI	58	+81.695s	0
12	18	Lance Stroll	ASTON MARTIN ARAMCO MERCEDES	58	+88.598s	0
13	47	Mick Schumacher	HAAS FERRARI	57	+1 lap	0
14	20	Kevin Magnussen	HAAS FERRARI	57	+1 lap	0
15	22	Yuki Tsunoda	ALPHATAURI RBPT	57	+1 lap	0
16	6	Nicholas Latifi	WILLIAMS MERCEDES	57	+1 lap	0
17	14	Fernando Alonso	ALPINE RENAULT	57	+1 lap	0
NC	1	Max Verstappen	RED BULL RACING RBPT	38	DNF	0
NC	5	Sebastian Vettel	ASTON MARTIN ARAMCO MERCEDES	22	DNF	0
NC	55	Carlos Sainz	FERRARI	1	DNF	0

 

 

* Provisional results. Note – Leclerc scored an additional point for setting the fastest lap of the race.

https://www.formula1.com/en/results.html/2022/races/1108/australia/race-result.html

 

Click here for the 2022 Formula 1 World Driver’s (Top 10) and Constructors Championship Standings.

 

Round four of the 2022 FIA Formula 1 World Champions returns to the famous Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari in Imola, Emilia Romagna for the Formula 1 Rolex Gran Premio Del Made In Italy E Dell’Emilia Romagna Grand Prix 2022 from Friday April 22-Sunday April 24.