Bharath Kumar

Aborted start! 2 Formation laps! 4 Safety car sessions!. Incident, accident and drama and though it all came Fernando Alonso walked away with his 1st Australian Grand Prix and his second of the season to strengthen his early stranglehold on a second straight drivers’ title. The only thing missing is rain on a perfect day of Formula1.

It was not such a good day for Giancarlo Fisichella and Juan Pablo Montoya in the second Renault and McLaren as both had their own drama even before the race had got underway. Montoya, who qualified in fifth position, was bust warming up his brakes and tyres as he exited the final turn to approach the starting grid. The Colombian lost control of his McLaren and it seemed he was in for a long day from the back of the pack. Fortunately for him Giancarlo Fisichella inexplicably stalled his Renault on the front row of the grid. This forced another formation lap and Montoya was able to regain his position and Fisichella started the race from the pit lane.

Starting from the third Pole Position of his career Jenson Button actually maintained the lead of the race heading into the first turn. Behind chaos ensued as Felipe Massa clipped the back of Christian Klien into the first turn. Massa veered sharply to his right following the impact and wiped the rear wing off the back of Rosberg’s Williams Cosworth. The safety car was deployed and Massa and Rosberg were both out of the race. The race restarted on lap 3 with Alonso timing a perfect pass of Button into the first turn to take the lead. Raikkonen then hounded Button to battle for second place.

On lap 4 Klien’s car snapped out of control while under braking and hit the wall, bringing out the Safety Car again on lap 7 to clear debris. The race restarted on lap 9, with Raikkonen passing Button for second. Button continued to drop back behind Alonso and Raikkonen, with Montoya pushing from behind. On lap 11, Liuzzi passed Michael Schumacher for 8th place, the German driver seeming to have trouble putting in competitive lap times.

On lap 33 Michael Schumacher ran wide at the final corner, losing control and crashing into the wall, bringing out the Safety car once more - most of the runners diving into the pits. On lap 37 the race resumed, Montoya getting bumped from behind by Fisichella while Heidfeld fell to fourth place. At the same time Liuzzi went into the wall, bringing out the fourth Safety Car period for debris. The race was restarted once again on lap 40, Montoya getting past Heidfeld for fourth. On lap 46, Montoya ran wide at the final corner, nearly duplicating Michael Schumacher’s accident, but collected it up and then slowed and retired with an electronic fault on the pit straight when looking all set to make the bottom step of the podium.

Jenson Button’s day started brightly but ended in a huge cloud of smoke. The Honda racer simply could not lap as fast as his rivals on cold tyres and was unable to challenge either Alonso or Raikkonen for race pace. Button would look all set to finish in fifth position but as he exited the final turn his Honda V8 failed in dramatic style. Button pulled the billowing RA106 to a halt just shy of the chequered flag and his fifth position turned into a tenth place classification. And Ralf Schumacher deserves special mention for a third-place finish for Toyota – despite having taken a drive-through penalty for speeding in the pitlane. Nick Heidfeld’s fourth-place finish for BMW Sauber was also well-deserved after a strong, determined drive. Mark Webber could well have finished on the podium in his Williams Cosworth had the FW28 gone the distance. Running fourth at mid-distance Webber pulled the Williams off track with either a hydraulics or gearbox failure.

The result means that Alonso’s lead at the head of the Drivers’ championship is up to 14 points over Fisichella and Raikkonen, while in the Constructors’ championship, Renault is on 42 points – 19 ahead of second placed McLaren with Ferrari third on 15 points.