The Formula 1 championship season for 2026 started yesterday with the opening race in Melbourne. Mercedes was expected to be strong this season, and the team was true to form with drivers George Russell and Andrea Kimi Antonelli qualifying in the top two places. Isack Hadjar drove exceptionally well in his first qualifying session for Red Bull, making it to third and beating the Ferraris and McLarens. His senior teammate Max Verstappen crashed out of qualifying early on due to a technical problem. Defending champion driver Lando Norris qualified in sixth place.
On race day, disaster struck early for McLaren’s Oscar Piastri (a Melburnian) with a combination of driver error (by Mr. Piastri’s account) and technical problems launching his car into a spin and into the barriers on the reconnaissance lap. I do not quite believe it; I think Mr. Piastri was being diplomatic and trying to shift most of the blame onto himself so as to take criticism off the team and the technical aspects of the car.
The starting lights followed an unusual pattern, with the last light barely flickering on for just a moment before all the lights went out and the race began. Usually, there are at least a few seconds from the last light until the ‘lights out’ moment. In any case, the Ferraris of Charles Leclerc and Sir Lewis Hamilton had excellent starts. Leclerc went right into the lead, overtaking polesitter Mr. Russell.
Mr. Hadjar suffered a technical failure early into the race, and ended up retiring from the event. This brought out the first virtual safety car of the race, and both Mercedes drivers had pitstops, while both Ferrari drivers continued without stopping. Normally, conventional wisdom would have dictated stopping immediately if the race had progressed to anywhere near the first pitstop window, and in this case—although maybe a touch early—stopping seemed the more sensible option. I suspect Ferrari followers had a sinking feeling in their stomachs when the scarlet cars kept going around the circuit, and a radio excerpt showed Sir Lewis opining that at least one of the Ferraris should have taken a pitstop.
The rest of the race was fairly uneventful, with perhaps a bit more overtaking than in a typical race from last season—only to be expected, with the new regulations in place this year. Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso Diaz and Lance Stroll both retired but then returned to the race at various points, no doubt to gather as much racing data as possible. Much had been expected of Aston Martin this year, with the cars being legendary designer Adrian Newey’s first designs for this team, but technical problems saw the team completing minimal testing over the break since last season, and it looks like the problems are continuing into at least the early part of this season.
Mr. Russell and Mr. Antonelli comfortably took the top two finishing positions, resulting in a Mercedes one-two. Mr. Leclerc and Sir Lewis finished next for a Ferrari three-four. Defending champion Mr. Norris finished the race in an unremarkable fifth place, but four-time champion Mr. Verstappen took his Red Bull car from a lowly twentieth position on the starting grid to sixth—clearly the most places gained by any driver in this race, and only to be expected from the man still widely considered the best driver in the field.
As expected for the first race after major changes in regulations, the Melbourne event was quite chaotic at times, and some early concerns about ‘ping-pong’ overtaking (where there is a lot of overtaking and re-overtaking due to the regulations, rather than due to driver skill or technical superiority) may have been realised. There were a few times when cars overtook and re-overtook each other on consecutive laps (most notably Mr. Russell and Mr. Leclerc battling over the lead in the first few laps) but this was just from the highlights; I was not able to see the race in its entirety.
At this very early stage, unless some teams are able to make significant advances through the season, it looks like Mercedes is clearly the leading team, with Ferrari coming a clear but not distant second. Red Bull and McLaren seem fairly comparable for now. Aston Martin could potentially be a team to watch if it can overcome its technical problems. If Mercedes maintains its performance relative to the rest of the field, Mr. Russell will be the favourite to take the drivers’ championship.