The long winter is over, and Melbourne didn’t waste a second reminding the rookies how brutal Formula 1 can be. After a damp start gave way to a drying track, a sudden downpour late in the race sent cars skating off in all directions. Some adapted. Others folded. Want to know more? Then read on.
Top of the class
Lando Norris – Qualifying: P2 | Race: P1
After closing 2024 with a win in Abu Dhabi, Norris picked up exactly where he left off. Gone were the early-season strategy fumbles and pit wall panic that plagued McLaren in early 2024. In came a cleanly executed win and Lando’s first time leading the championship.
He wasn’t perfect; both McLarens went off in turn 12 in the final shower, but he held it together when it counted. Norris skated off, regrouped, and crucially kept his head when Piastri didn’t. He won’t say it out loud, doesn’t want to jinx it by looking too far ahead, but it’s a hell of a way to start a title campaign.
Kimi Antonelli – Qualifying: P17 | Race: P4
Mercedes nailed the tyre call, but Antonelli did the rest. The conditions were treacherous; four of the six rookies crashed out. Yet, the 18-year-old calmly climbed thirteen places, while even more seasoned drivers were starting to break a sweat.
His P4 finish came after a five-second penalty for an unsafe release was overturned (rightly so, if you ask me).
There’s still a long road ahead, but this was a seriously convincing first step for this rookie, and certainly explains the fact that Mercedes signed him on so readily.
And the honourable mention goes to Max Verstappen.
Our resident WDC usually excels in the rain, but the Red Bull looked off the boil all weekend. It certainly was no match for McLaren in the dry, but Max still took advantage of the changeable weather and maximised what was available. He muscled past both McLarens at the start, ran long when others pitted early, and closed in again late when the rain arrived.
This wasn’t anything like his 2023 dominance or 2024 consistency, but it was still a worrying message to anyone hoping he’d stumble. Yes, the RB21 doesn’t look dialled in yet. Yes, McLaren had the quicker package. But if this is Max on the back foot, the rest of the grid ought to be nervous.
Struggle bus
Liam Lawson – Qualifying: P19 | Race: DNF
Red Bull’s gamble on passing over Yuki for a rookie got off to the worst possible start.
Lawson looked out of his depth all weekend: miles off the pace in Q1, anonymous in the dry, and visibly unsettled even before the rain hit. When it did, he lasted barely a sector before binning it in eerily similar fashion to Hadjar in the formation lap (we’ll get to that).
He’s built a reputation on adapting quickly, but this skill seemed AWOL when it mattered most. You could almost hear the Perez sympathisers logging into X en masse, ready to cry injustice over his ousting at Red Bull and fire off a self-satisfied “told you so.” So, all in all, it was truly a weekend to forget for Liam.
Isack Hadjar – Qualifying: P11 | Race: DNF (formation lap)
Hadjar had impressed in qualifying and looked set to join the midfield fight, until he threw it off the road before the lights went out.
It was a high-profile embarrassment, made worse by the fact that Racing Bulls looked genuinely competitive. It’ll be hard to recover from that kind of start to a debut season.
Carlos Sainz – Qualifying: P10 | Race: DNF
The stat sheet says zero laps completed, and that about sums it up. Sainz, on his Williams debut, ended up in the wall before we even saw green flags. He blamed a “torque kick” during upshifts, but whatever the cause, the result was the same: a wrecked car, no race and all that pre-season momentum gone in an instant.
He stuck around on the pit wall and ‘helped’ Albon with strategy, which certainly did numbers in the fan spheres on the socials. But he shouldn’t have been there in the first place. Williams had the pace for a top-five finish, and Sainz handed it away before the race even started properly.
And the dishonourable mention of the day goes to Oscar Piastri.
It was shaping up to be the dream home weekend. Then it unravelled… It perhaps wasn’t a total disaster, but certainly a frustrating missed opportunity when a podium was within reach.
Piastri stayed within range of Norris in the first stint, closed the gap when the track dried, and looked poised to challenge when Verstappen ran long. But when the rain returned, both McLarens went off. Norris recovered, Piastri didn’t.
The Aussie spun across the grass and dropped down the order. Painful enough in any race, twice as bad when it’s your home crowd watching.
That was a wild start to the 2025 season. Lando Norris leads the championship for the first time in his career. The rookies were thrown straight into the deep end (and most of them sank). Carlos Sainz barely made it through a single lap. And while Red Bull looked beatable, Verstappen still banked big points. It’s early days, but if Melbourne is anything to go by, this season might have some bite.
Next stop: Shanghai. The Chinese Grand Prix returns for the first time since 2019, with lights out at 7 am UK time on Sunday, March 23rd.
