After the soul-crushing disappointment that was Bahrain, F1 responded to it's critics in the best possible way by providing a thriller of a race at a damp Albert Park circuit. It just goes to show that a track where overtaking is actually physically possible, combined with a splash of rain to mix up the strategies is all it takes to produce an entertaining spectacle - perhaps a sprinkler system should be installed at Bahrain...
Qualifying was utterly dominated by the Red Bull team, with Vettel and Webber locking out the front row for the Austrian team in that order, followed by Bahrain victor Alonso, a suprising pacey Jenson Button, Felipe Massa and the 2 Mercedes cars - Rosberg once again edging Schuey. Hamilton could only muster a lowly 11th on the grid, albeit an improvement on the previous year's race...
The whole field began the race on intermediate tyres as the lights turned green. Vettel led comfortably, but a superb getaway from Massa from 5th on the grid allowed him to slide underneath home hero Webber to snatch 2nd postition. Behind them, Alonso and Button got a little too close to each other round turn 1, resulting in the former being spun around and falling to the very tail of the pack, giving Schumacher a fair old knock for good measure which neccesitated him pitting for a new front wing. Kubica took advantage of the mayhem to jump from 9th on the grid to 4th, ahead of Rosberg, Button, Hamilton and Sutil. Soon after, the brand new Mercedes-Benz SLS Safety Car was deployed in the wake of a hefty midfield shunt between Kobayashi, Buemi and Hulkenberg. When it peeled back into the pits, Massa looked like passing Webber, but couldn't quite pull off the move. Meanwhile, Alonso and Schumacher were carving their ways back through the pack after their early contact.
As the rain began to ease, Button became the first person to gamble on a switch to slick tyres - a move that would prove to be inspired, even if it didn't seem like it when he understeered in an airport trolley-like manner into the kittylitter at turn 3... A couple of laps later however, the reigning champion began setting the pace, which resulted in the entire field bar the Red Bulls, Force Indias and Alguersauri resorting to slicks. The following lap Vettel pitted, but bizzarely Webber was left to hang in there with intermediates for another lap. He fell to 6th after finally making his switch, whilst Vettel resumed in the lead from Button, Kubica, Rosberg, Massa, Webber, Barrichello, Hamilton and Alonso who by this stage had made a fine recovery from 18th to 9th. Hamilton and Alonso soon made short work of Barrichello, but as more spots of rain began to appear, Massa lost some pace allowing Webber, Hamilton and Alonso to all close up to him. The Brit made his way to the head of this bunch after several swaps of position, before also reeling in Rosberg and him for 4th place.
All the while, Vettel was enjoying a comfortable lead before 'Luscious Liz' let him down for the second time in as many races, this time the brakes being responsible. Unlike last time however, the German was forced to retire on the spot. This handed Button the race lead on a silver platter, with his McLaren teammate hassling Kubica's Renault for what became 2nd place. Rosberg became under pressure from Webber for 4th place, with Alonso stuck behind his seemingly slower teammate in 7th. In the next few laps, Hamilton, Webber and Rosberg all opted to pit for fresh rubber, allowing Massa and Alonso into 3rd and 4th places. Hamilton and Webber began to close up to the Ferrari pairing, still on their first set of dry, and by now very worn tyres. Button now looked likely to cruise to a relatively easy victory, with Kubica now leading a tightly packed field of himself, Massa, Alonso, Hamilton, Webber and Rosberg. Soon after closing onto the back of his Alonso, Hamilton complained that his tyres had now grained, leaving him unable to make a move on his arch-rival. Then, on the penultimate lap, Webber decided to risk a bold move up the inside of the Briton at turn 13, which resulted in the pair of them in the gravel, losing several positions all the while.
No such worry for the sister McLaren however - Button took his 8th career win and his first for his new McLaren team, and perhaps more significantly scored an equaliser in the intra-team battle between himself and Hamilton. Kubica held on in second to sweep Renault's best result since the 2008 Brazilian Grand Prix, with Massa taking the final podium spot from Alonso. Rosberg followed in 5th, with Hamilton recovering from his late contact with Webber to take 6th. The Australian however also lost places to Liuzzi and Barrichello after pitting for a new nose to take a lowly 9th. Michael Schumacher endured a tricky afternoon, stuck behind Alguersauri for 20 laps to take just one solitary point for 10th. The Toro Rosso driver would wind up 11th, from countryman De La Rosa, with Kovalainen winning the unofficial 'Class B' race in 13th from Chandhok who registered his first finish. Their respective teammates both succumbed to mechanical maladies, Trulli before the race began and Senna just 4 laps in. Their rivals at Virgin admitted to having a fuel tank too small to finish the race, although neither Glock nor Di Grassi lasted long enough to illustrate this fact. They joined Sutil and Petrov in failing to finish, as well as all those who crashed early on.
Now, we look forward to Malaysia in a week's time, but it still remains to be seen whether Bahrain or Australia was the exception to the amount of excitement we'll get this season...
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