F1 2026 - Round 1 - Australia - Melbourne 🇦🇺

how much was the low tyre wear today down to the slower lap times? The compounds are the same, but everyone on a one stopper seemed to have little problems extending.

I haven’t verified this, but I saw online that merc were lapping almost 1sec quicker on 35 lap old hards versus Norris on new hards, and Norris was being chased by VER, while the mercs were cruising out front.

It’s just now figuring out where to charge and deploy the battery racing. Whoever figures that out first will gain biggest advantage at start. Then it turns into a bore. It was enjoyable watching cars getting overtaken because of a battery level at that moment in time

it seems that many cars had no battery at all for the start, hence the wide mix of starts. Let’s see in china if they can figure out a way to charge the battery more on the formation lap

I don't know how you would arrive with zero charge, but I would assume you need to use the battery on the formation lap to get systems warmed up and rechecked, as well as needing the pace to get heat into your tyres. So you need to find the right balance

And the speed difference between the different compounds seems to be minimal

the Intercooler podcast today is an interesting synopsis. The TLDR being that it’s wasn’t really racing at the pin of your collar, which is what F1 is designed to be. It was ‘passing’ not ‘overtaking’.
max said as much afterwards when he was asked about moving through the field - he said it was more like a race leader lapping back markers.

the most stark stat for me was the pole lap time being 3.5s slower than last year, and likewise the fast lap of the race was a further 3s slower again. No wonder there was no major tyre deg