Formula 1: Australia Grand Prix Review

STARTS

For F1 fans who struggle with the challenge of an early-morning start, the Australian Grand Prix is a tricky beast.

On the one hand, it marks the start of a new season, with new faces, new cars, new rules (even if they last just one race) and, frankly, it feels wrong not to watch the event live.

[ROSBERG APOLOGISES TO HAMILTON]

On the other hand, there’s that ‘falling asleep in front of the telly and not knowing the result when you are wakened’ thing that sometimes happens, and it can really take the shine off a Sunday.

Well, not this year.

Melbourne put on a bonzer show, full of talking points. Here are five of the best.

Alonso’s unguided missile

The Spaniard clipped Esteban Gutierrez at around 200mph, sending his McLaren into the barriers, over some grass and then tumbling terrifyingly through the gravel trap.

Initially, the cameras picked up only the stationary car of Esteban but then it became apparent that the remains of another car were up against the barriers.

Alonso dragged himself from under the mangled wreckage, shaken but otherwise unhurt.

[PICTURE THIS: FERNANDO ALONSO WALKS AWAY FROM HORROR CRASH]

[ALONSO: YOU ARE JUST FLYING, AND THEN YOU SEE THE SKY, THE GROUND, THE SKY, THE GROUND]

[HAMILTON HAPPY TO ACHIEVE 'DAMAGE LIMITATION' AFTER BATTLING BACK]

That he survived at all is remarkable – the violence of the incident left his McLaren unrecognisable – but that he was unhurt is unbelievable.

As F1 fans, we expect crashes and we expect safety precautions but, if this crash told us anything, it is that we perhaps expect too much; drivers are mortal and, had his car impacted slightly differently on its surroundings, there can be little doubt we would have been mourning Alonso.

Oh, hello Ferrari

Lordy, those red cars were quick off the line. Ferrari may still be weak in some key areas but they appear to have mastered the new single-clutch starting procedure.

The sight of Sebastian Vettel carving his way between those apparently unbeatable Mercedes was enough to make the early rise worthwhile.

As the first lap came to an end, with Vettel surging away from the pack followed by team-mate Kimi Raikkonen, it looked like the era of Mercedes domination was over.

Not so fast, suckers.

Raikkonen was to retire with the flames of a sickly engine licking over his head, while Vettel’s race was compromised by a combination of bad luck and bad strategy – Ferrari engineering boss Jock Clear admitted the team had no idea how the medium compound tyres would perform on their car.

Mercedes, inevitably, completed most of their mammoth pre-season testing on those very tyres and used them to great effect in the race.

[FERRARI'S AGGRESSIVE TACTICS WERE WRONG, SAYS VETTEL]

[F1 SET TO SCRAP QUALIFYING FORMAT AFTER JUST ONE RACE]

A kick up the Haas

F1’s newbies, Haas, showed other smaller teams the way to get started in the sport. Their strategy of raiding the Ferrari parts bin for the core of their car paid handsomely, as the mercurial Romain Grosjean piloted his car home to sixth place, gifting Haas eight unexpected points in their debut race.

Grosjean, who tends to wear the bemused look of one who has stumbled into the wrong changing rooms, was the happiest man at the circuit. He gushed over the radio to his team that they had made history, and told reporters he felt as if he was standing on top of the podium.

The temptation on seeing this was to say ‘Aw, bless’ but, truth be told, it was a popular result and a deserved boost to the hard-working Haas crew.

Verstappen’s strop-start race

Now this is encouraging. While Hamilton and Rosberg were putting on a show of unity, and Vettel and his old sparring partner Mark Webber were about to have a love-in on the podium, the remarkable teenage talent that is Max Verstappen was whingeing and griping his way around the Melbourne circuit behind Toro Rosso team-mate Carlos Sainz.

Young Max had demanded to be allowed to pit first but was called in second, dropping him back into the race behind Sainz who, to be fair, looked to be the slower of the pair.

And so fans were treated to a cocktail of aggressive driving, as Verstappen harangued, harried and harumphed around his team-mate, at one point making contact with Sainz’s car and keeping fans amused with the odd bleeped-out message over the radio.

Verstappen is young, fast and, best of all, a gobby kid. This is good news for F1.

Hold the front page: Mercedes to win

They started pretty appallingly, they were unimpressive until Alonso’s crash stopped the race and then … they finished first and second.

You can see how this season might end.

Whenever a team has finished first and second in the Australian Grand Prix, it has gone on to take both the Drivers’ and Constructors’ titles.

And so, predictably, Mercedes have begun their long march to yet another champagne-soaked end-of-season.

But don’t despair. Firstly, there’s still plenty of action behind them, and Ferrari will keep them honest. At least until they run out of engines.

And, of course, there’s always the new season of the Hamilton v Rosberg soap opera to anticipate.

Finally, if it all gets too boring and predictable, Mercedes have a new secret weapon to keep us all entertained. He was pictured watching the race from the Merc garage … ladies and gentlemen, presenting the future of F1, Mr Timmy Mallet. Can’t be any wackier than Bernie, can he?