The “winter world championship” – Ron Dennis’ ironic moniker for the testing “silly season” that precedes the start of each year’s F1 World Championship, ended when the start lights went out in Melbourne. And, somewhat unusually, the form shown in testing held true for the season’s opening event…What a race! We all suspected the Brawn cars would surprise, but the one-two by Jenson Button and Rubens Barrichello – the first for a team on debut since Fangio and Kling pulled it off for Mercedes back in 1954 – was certainly not plain sailing for Ross’s fledgling team.
The “winter world championship” is certainly over, and we now have a good idea of where the contenders stand. And one thing’s for sure: some of the big guns have a lot of homework to do…
Melbourne’s “scratchy” street-circuit character resulted in the usual series of mishaps, so the order behind the Brackley cars wasn’t truly representative. Robert Kubica, Sebastian Vettel and the two Ferrari drivers are likely to show better in future races. So should Fernando Alonso, who was badly wrong-footed at the start by the carnage following Barrichello’s stall. Lewis Hamilton came through to a miraculous third place after missing the startline chaos and then profiting from the woes of the chasers behind Brawn. All credit to him for staying out of trouble, but McLaren needs to give him a better car. Toyota is thereabouts if it can avoid silly lapses such as flexible wings and Trulli’s illegal overtaking manoeuvre. And Nico Rosberg showed how quick the new Williams is: all he now needs is some consistency, which should come on more “conventional” circuits.
Rubens Barrichello made a telling comment after the Melbourne race. “The car’s pace is not just because of the diffuser,” he said. “After the incidents at the start my diffuser was completely broken. The car lost some performance, certainly, but it was still quick.” What he was suggesting was that, even if rivals move to copy the Brawn’s controversial rear-end aerodynamics, or if the FIA Court of Appeal bans the concept, the team will still be front-runners.
It underlines the fact that the double in Australia was no fairytale result. An F1 car is a complex machine, and the technical team under Ross Brawn has done a superb job on every aspect of the car. Expect Jenson and Rubens to be front-runners in Malaysia this weekend…
