Australian GP Results

Australian GP: Raikkonen takes emphatic victory in season opener

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Kimi Raikkonen played a two-stop strategy to perfection to beat Fernando Alonso to victory in an enthralling Australian Grand Prix.

All predictions of tedious Red Bull domination proved way off the mark, as Sebastian Vettel finished third, overshadowed by the Lotus and Ferrari.
The champion's team-mate Mark Webber was only sixth after a poor start, behind Felipe Massa's Ferrari and Lewis Hamilton's Mercedes, while Force India driver Adrian Sutil also led for long periods.
The superiority Red Bull had displayed in all the weekend's dry running so far was never evident in the race.
Webber immediately plunged outside the top five with a poor start, and Vettel was unable to get away from the fast-starting Massa and Alonso, who both passed Hamilton on lap one.
Raikkonen overtook the Mercedes soon afterwards, and then closed in on Vettel, Massa and Alonso to make a four-car lead train.
All the frontrunners pitted very early to get rid of their fragile super-soft tyres.


The order among that quartet remained the same into the second stint, but they had to fight their way through those running longer, including Sutil - who had started on mediums and found himself in the lead by lap 15.
Vettel, the Ferraris and Raikkonen were soon on the Force India's tail. They could not pass though, and Sutil was able to make his first pitstop at the same time as Vettel, Massa and Alonso made their second, bringing the Force India onto the same sequence as the victory contenders.
Alonso pitted a lap before Sutil and Vettel and was able to leapfrog both.
Sutil stayed ahead of Vettel in the pits but was overtaken into Turn 3 a lap later. Vettel could not put any pressure on Alonso however, even as the Ferrari had to battle through drivers on other strategies - including Hamilton, with whom the Spaniard had a spectacular dice before getting clear.
By this time, Raikkonen's strategy had come into play.
He stayed out until lap 34, a dozen laps longer than the other leaders, making it clear that Lotus was going for a two-stop to their three.
That left him with a comfortable lead over Alonso and Vettel when they made their third stops, and although the Ferrari initially began carving chunks from the Lotus's advantage, once Alonso had used his new-tyre grip, the gap stabilised.

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Raikkonen was therefore able to claim victory by 12 seconds, as Alonso pulled 10s clear of Vettel.

Massa faded in fourth after a very strong first half of the race.
Hamilton was next up, having had to abandon his intended two-stop strategy and pit for a third time. Webber made a quiet recovery to sixth, just behind Hamilton, whose team-mate Nico Rosberg retired with electrical problems.
Sutil stayed with the leaders until he finally had to take on super-softs with 12 laps to go. They did not last as he had hoped, and Sutil had to be content with seventh, just ahead of team-mate Paul di Resta.
Jenson Button finished ninth for McLaren, while Romain Grosjean completed the scorers, holding off Sergio Perez and Jean-Eric Vergne.
Nico Hulkenberg failed to take the start due to a pre-race fuel system problem on his Sauber. Pastor Maldonado spun off at Turn 1 before half-distance, and Daniel Ricciardo retired a sick-sounding Toro Rosso.
Jules Bianchi dominated the backmarker pack in 15th.

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/106109

Sick to death of all the media giving out the result before it's on TV without a warning, they can manage to do it with football why not F1

I forgot it was on and read the results on Twitter first thing this morning. Very annoying

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Originally Posted by liveseytowers

I forgot it was on and read the results on Twitter first thing this morning. Very annoying

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I avoid everything until I've seen the race, even DF as in the past a few numpties have posted the result in the title. As for the race it wasn't that exciting. Hamilton looks comfortable in the mercedes and the Mclarens look shite.

Also I thought they weren't allowed the stepped noses this year? I thought it was in the rules to get rid of them?

No, as far as I'm aware stepped noses are still there but there has been an introduction of something called a vanity panel which basically covers up the step so they don't look so ugly. Not all teams have done it to the same degree I think.

As for the race a bit of a surprise. Looks like it could be a similar start to last year with quite a few winners covering the first few races, although Kimi did look very strong towards the end of the race. Watched the highlights on iplayer, anyone else think the BBC commentary a bit poor?

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Originally Posted by yazooo

Watched the highlights on iplayer, anyone else think the BBC commentary a bit poor?

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yeah its pants lol i watched the race live on sky and thought the commentary was decent but then the BBC feels like it was from 1940, the only thing i am gutted about on the sky coverage is that georgie thompson has left and looks like she will be signing with BT sports.

Yes a pity Thompson is gone. Sky commentary is good, but hate the idiot who fronts the show. Lazenby or something like that.

yeah he is a proper cock, they need to sign up eddie jordan lol or shoulda broke the bank to get jake humphries over there

Jake Humphrey didn't want to travel anymore. His deal at the new BT Sports channel is not that lucrative.


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