2022 Australian Grand Prix: Post Race Analysis

[SS454]

Some layout changes to Albert Park which not everyone was happy about. 4 DRS zones seemed very extreme, so it was nice to see one get removed. Interestingly, even with 3 DRS zones, the passing wasn't easy.

Ferrari and Leclerc absolutely dominated that race. Fast pace, easy to drive, best tire wear, fast pitstop. It all went right for Charles. It has been asked, what could Leclerc do with a proper car, well he showed it today. Fantastic drive. Carlos unfortunately had a terrible weekend. A lot of bad luck went his way, including a steering wheel swap just a minute before the formation lap and that seemed to cause his bad start. Sadly his race ended with his own mistake. That's racing though. The car did show some horrendous porpoising in the race, so that issue still needs to be rectified.

Red Bull did not look good at this track. Max really struggled with the setup and balance and despite moments of being fast, they never had a fight against Charles. Add insult to injury with a car that isn't even reliable, and their championship hopes are slipping away. Perez can be happy with a P2 result, especially since his pace was just ahead of the struggling Mercedes.

Mercedes can certainly be happy today. Their race starts again show be extremely strong. Oddly, their porpoising was not as bad as in other races, and whatever compromises they have done to fix that didn't seem to hurt their pace as this was the most competitive they shown all season. Russell certainly benefited with some good fortune, and unbelievably now sits 2nd in the WDC. Lewis probably would have finished 3rd without Russell getting lucky, but the best points achieved for the team. If the car gets sorted out and is fast as they claim, then they are still in a pretty good position for the championships.

McLaren performing where they should be. Hard to say if they will continue to fight as the best 3rd or 4th best team in upcoming races as their car seems to be track dependent. Lando a usual solid result, but it was great to see Ricciardo have similar pace as his teammate in front of his home crowd.

Alpine likely missed a great opportunity for a very great result. Decent points for Ocon, but Alonso had the pace to do so much more. After bad luck in quali, his race strategy just didn't go his way, and then with the medium tires he couldn't make the passes and destroyed his tires very quickly.

Alfa Romeo at times appear to be a car capable of fighting for 5th place, then suddenly can be fighting outside the top 10. Bottas really had to fight for that 8th place and Zhou continues to get up to speed.

AlphaTauri still surprises me they are not faster. Gasly was arguably the 2021 most valuable driver, but even he is making errors with their 2022 car. Tsunoda looked to have a shot at some points, but somehow finished 15th despite 4 faster cars having issues. Barely getting points has to be considered a disappointment for that team.

Williams get their first points which is a huge result. Albon was amazing during the race and again shows the strange characteristics of the tires. Nearly the full race on 1 set of tires, and his times were good, especially considering being in perhaps the worst chassis. Albon's gap over Latifi seems to be even bigger than Russell over Latifi.

Aston Martin had a rough rough weekend. Give a hand to their mechanics for persevering though the drives wrecking the cars. Lance Stroll somehow was up their battling for points. His 5 second penalty for weaving may have been harsh considering what we have seen Verstappen do in the past. But when you factor in his bully move on Bottas that pushed him off the track, he probably deserved a penalty, not even factoring his bone head move in qualifying. Vettel had a terrible opening to his season, and another mistake that wrecked another car. I'm sure Lawrence Stroll will have some words behind closed doors and potentially destroy the team's morale even more.

Haas did not have the pace they showed in the first two races. Hopefully they don't fall back to the bottom of the grid. Mick finally got the best of his teammate, but he still made plenty of mistakes and it was far from a great drive. Magnusson came in feeling a bit ill and just didn't drive well all weekend.

Driver of the Day: While it would be easy to pick Leclerc, I am going to go with Alex Albon. The Williams is trash, he destroyed his teammate, set faster laps than the fastest cars around him despite being on tires 50+ laps old, and got a point to show for it. That's a proper challenge and exceeded any hopes or expectations.

[KingCharles]

I always look forward to your balanced write-ups.

[aroutis]

Just a few thoughts
Merc was better in this race but undoubtedly spent a lot of their budget to bring their car to this level. Question is.. how much and how much is left for the rest of the long championship?
Whereas Ferrari has pretty much done nothing; yet. Which should be a scary thought for the competition.

Of course, having said that, Ferrari should keep head down and keep pushing mercilessly. Only way to get both WDC and WCC. We have the drivers, we have the car, we have the team.

[SS454]

Just a few thoughts
Merc was better in this race but undoubtedly spent a lot of their budget to bring their car to this level. Question is.. how much and how much is left for the rest of the long championship?
Whereas Ferrari has pretty much done nothing; yet. Which should be a scary thought for the competition.

Of course, having said that, Ferrari should keep head down and keep pushing mercilessly. Only way to get both WDC and WCC. We have the drivers, we have the car, we have the team.

I haven't seen any major updates from Mercedes since the season began either. Both RBR and Mercedes brought track specific wings to Saudi Arabia, while as far as I could tell Ferrari did not. How much of the budget has been spent is a huge unknown. Ferrari may have spent the same amount but just haven't brought the parts to the track as they are designed for big updates starting at Imola. I think Ferrari are still in a great position as Mercedes are spending money chasing a problem, and Red Bull is too, while Ferrari can spend money to improve the car.

[Greig]

Just a few thoughts
Merc was better in this race but undoubtedly spent a lot of their budget to bring their car to this level. Question is.. how much and how much is left for the rest of the long championship?
Whereas Ferrari has pretty much done nothing; yet. Which should be a scary thought for the competition.

Of course, having said that, Ferrari should keep head down and keep pushing mercilessly. Only way to get both WDC and WCC. We have the drivers, we have the car, we have the team.

Merc were miles away from our pace, track just hid a lot of their problems.

[Gilles]

I haven't seen any major updates from Mercedes since the season began either. Both RBR and Mercedes brought track specific wings to Saudi Arabia, while as far as I could tell Ferrari did not. How much of the budget has been spent is a huge unknown. Ferrari may have spent the same amount but just haven't brought the parts to the track as they are designed for big updates starting at Imola. I think Ferrari are still in a great position as Mercedes are spending money chasing a problem, and Red Bull is too, while Ferrari can spend money to improve the car.

Exactly and this situation must undoubtedly scare off the competition

[paneristi]

And having RUS on 2nd point standing is better than VER, as RBR is more of a threat than Merc. Of course, we all want LEC & SAI 1-2

[JacKy]

Leclerc reached 320 km/s Top Speed which Top of the Chart

Comes with DRS + Tow from haas on the last lap.

[paneristi]

LEC on another league

https://youtu.be/_qBrN1ZWWe0

[roddick_andy]

Binotto: "Melbourne is not an easy track to find the balance between the slow and fast corners. We focused on protecting the rear tyres first and realised already on Friday that with the mediums the front left tyre starts to suffer from graining. We worked on that."

Binotto: "Charles also did a good job with tyre management."

Charles: "Ferrari has given me a wonderful car. It's a dream to drive. We had no problem with graining and were able to use them optimally from the first to the last lap."

Charles: "We have eliminated our weaknesses, which we still had in 2020 and 2021, step by step. I have a car that no longer forces me to do special things to get more speed out of it now."

Charles is also not afraid of the development battle with Red Bull:

"I trust the people who built this car. They are the same people who will develop it further."

Whether a steering wheel change on the grid was the reason for Carlos‘s poor start is still being investigated by Ferrari.

Binotto: "Actually, it shouldn't be, because the steering wheel settings have to be the same when changing under parc fermé conditions."

Melbourne brought out the qualities of the F1-75. It is fast regardless of the asphalt temperature and tyre compound, over one lap and race distance, they are reliable and easy on the tyres.

Charles: "If it continues in this style, we can think about the championship."

[roddick_andy]

Mercedes: The Car is porpoising to much and is costing us performance

Ferrari: We had to let the car porpoise so we can be faster...

[KingCharles]

Should team orders come into immediate effect from now on?

[elnano14]

Should team orders come into immediate effect from now on?

Too soon as think , mathematically Carlos is still in the championship contender, as long as he "can" keep up with Charles (which I highly doubt) and Redbull can't get near us

[subfire91]

Should team orders come into immediate effect from now on?

ferrari should not that!! it is too early. if you do such a thing after only 3 out of 23 races you are effectively loosing the other driver both mentally and in terms of motive. and it probably will affect the following years also. this must be done in the second half of the season IF the difference is vast

[tpe]

CS has to relax.
He is very anxious to get his first pole/win.
He has to calm down and get his act togetther. Overdriving and rushing is always a disaster in F1. He is smart but I think his emotions are very prominent right now. I hope he talks with Binotto and he can expalin this to him,

As for the race, my driver of the day is Albon.
Donkey of the day Alonso. He is too experienced to know that mediums would not make it

[wisepie]

Should team orders come into immediate effect from now on?

Much too early and it doesn't take long for situations to change, we're only on race 3 out of 23 so anything can happen.

[Tifoso]

Merc were miles away from our pace, track just hid a lot of their problems.

Exactly. You could see it. After the pits, he was flying.
Without the SCs he could have conceivably lapped most of the field.

[Gilles]

It seems tyre management was the key for this gap. All the others teams were sruggling, not Charles. This car can do miracles this year. Hard times ahead for the competition

[Tifoso]

It seems tyre management was the key for this gap. All the others teams were sruggling, not Charles. This car can do miracles this year. Hard times ahead for the competition

Agree completely. :wine

[jgonzalesm6]

Hard times ahead for the competition

We're winning battles but we have'nt won the war yet. Let's see how the mid-season ends and starts. If Leclerc and Ferrari are still dominant to include Sainz 3/4's of the way into the season then we can surmise that it will be hard times ahead for the competition.

[Tifoso]

I wonder if the other teams are sandbagging? Maybe they got so used to it in the preseason. :roll:-D

[jgonzalesm6]

I wonder if the other teams are sandbagging? Maybe they got so used to it in the preseason. :roll:-D

Naaah. Ferrari just has to fix the porpoising issue.

RedBull has to fix their fuel problem issue.....2 races already with fuel issues.

Mercedes definitely got it wrong coming out of the gates..........however I still remain caustious about Mercedes at this point in the season. Had this been Mercedes 3/4's of the way into the season, then no way can they catch up.

[paolo lalli]

They mercedes will run out of money before they become solid contenders .

[JacKy]

By my calculation without the Safety Car out laps the gap would have been like this

+20 Sec to Versappen (0.35s)
+50 Sec to Perez (0.91s)
+60 Sec to Mercedes (1.03s)

Stunning pace

[XXX132]

CS has to relax.
He is very anxious to get his first pole/win.
He has to calm down and get his act togetther. Overdriving and rushing is always a disaster in F1. He is smart but I think his emotions are very prominent right now. I hope he talks with Binotto and he can expalin this to him,



Agreed, the lad needs the mental discipline to stop overdriving the car when he's out of position, and let the race come to him; or minimise the damage if it doesn't. He's in arguably the best car on the grid. Crash or win is not necessary.

[Gilles]

Agreed, the lad needs the mental discipline to stop overdriving the car when he's out of position, and let the race come to him; or minimise the damage if it doesn't. He's in arguably the best car on the grid. Crash or win is not necessary.

He have also to deal with the best driver on the grid, this is not the better place to be for a young driver as Leclerc is also young

[Gilles]

By my calculation without the Safety Car out laps the gap would have been like this

+20 Sec to Versappen (0.35s)
+50 Sec to Perez (0.91s)
+60 Sec to Mercedes (1.03s)

Stunning pace

I think RB made a mistake in setting the car
However, as the Ferrari offers more ease, this kind of error could happen again, or at least RB could find itself limited in its settings to challenge Ferrari. They could recover with updates, but they are limited by budget cap

[scudieros]

What's going on with RB fuel issues? Are they trying to do a Ferrari 2019 style improvement to their PU but haven't quite managed it yet?

[jgonzalesm6]

What's going on with RB fuel issues? Are they trying to do a Ferrari 2019 style improvement to their PU but haven't quite managed it yet?

[shoulder shrug emoji] [hands up in the air emoji]

[aroutis]

It seems tyre management was the key for this gap. All the others teams were sruggling, not Charles. This car can do miracles this year. Hard times ahead for the competition

The way that Charles was like "Do we go for fastest lap?", getting a no from pitwall, then going for it regardless, had me laughing.
Not sure if the rest of the teams were laughing tho. :lol

[ferrari4life]

Anyone have any idea if our pace was just a function of the nature of the AUS track compared to the previous 2 gp's? or did we finally open it up and carry less downforce and this is were we really are with a decent gap to RB.

[Cavallino]

Anyone have any idea if our pace was just a function of the nature of the AUS track compared to the previous 2 gp's? or did we finally open it up and carry less downforce and this is were we really are with a decent gap to RB.

no, we were still slower in sector 2 where it is mostly flat

[Tifoso]

I don’t “know”, but this was supposed to be RB’s track. Sure didn’t look like it to me. :-)

[Tony]

The way that Charles was like "Do we go for fastest lap?", getting a no from pitwall, then going for it regardless, had me laughing.
Not sure if the rest of the teams were laughing tho. :lol

And he could have gone even faster than that, he was lapping cars while still pulling off the fastest lap of the race...

[Tony]

I wonder if the other teams are sandbagging? Maybe they got so used to it in the preseason. :roll:-D

:clap

[Gilles]

Anyone have any idea if our pace was just a function of the nature of the AUS track compared to the previous 2 gp's? or did we finally open it up and carry less downforce and this is were we really are with a decent gap to RB.

After a setting which was, by far, not the best possible in the Saudi race, i think we did a very good job on the car and this time RB did not (explaining such a gap)
Maybe we took some risk in lowering the rear, increasing the power (maybe), and changing aero balance.
The main factor could have been to lower the rear (still have to be confirmed), it could have give us more load and less drag, something linked with the less charged rear wing, the bigger front wing, the increase in top speed and the drivers' agreed porpoising. Still suppositions, but really possible ones

[ferrari4life]

After a setting which was, by far, not the best possible in the Saudi race, i think we did a very good job on the car and this time RB did not (explaining such a gap)
Maybe we took some risk in lowering the rear, increasing the power (maybe), and changing aero balance.
The main factor could have been to lower the rear (still have to be confirmed), it could have give us more load and less drag, something linked with the less charged rear wing, the bigger front wing, the increase in top speed and the drivers' agreed porpoising. Still suppositions, but really possible ones

yeah i was wondering if we changed something that increased the porpoising but made us faster. However we made a big jump from SA.

[SS454]

yeah i was wondering if we changed something that increased the porpoising but made us faster. However we made a big jump from SA.

Most likely a ride height change. I also suspect different spring rates and shock settings can have an effect of controlling the porpoising.

[Gilles]

Most likely a ride height change. I also suspect different spring rates and shock settings can have an effect of controlling the porpoising.

Sure, but the result could be a lot less traction. I think Ferrari chose the opposite, soft rear springs, maybe a lower rear, all balanced by forward aerodynamic loading and it works. Doesn't matter if it causes an increase in porpoising, as long as there is no high speed curve

[gump1480]

Sure, but the result could be a lot less traction. I think Ferrari chose the opposite, soft rear springs, maybe a lower rear, all balanced by forward aerodynamic loading and it works. Doesn't matter if it causes an increase in porpoising, as long as there is no high speed curve

Yeah...that high speed curves were missing in Melbourne is what allowed us to go with aggressive ride height. This configuration may not work in Silverstone. Hopefully by Barcelona we can bring a new floor to completely eradicate the porpoising issue.