The last time the winner of the opening race was world champion happened in 2011 with Sebastian Vettel, which was also the Australian GP.
The Manor were not even allowed to participate in the race as they could not participate nor in practice or in qualifying, so none of their cars lined up the outset.
With Sauber, there is a confusion. Van Der Garde won in court proceedings against the team claiming he had a contract at the present time as a driver. The team appealed and he was out of the race for the absence of the super-license (and according to reports he was treated as the “under dog” during the weekend by his alleged staff) – we’ll see how this will end…
As for the race, it began with only 15 cars – apart from the absence of the Manor team, Bottas with back pain did not participate, Magnussen and Kvyat with mechanical problems, also did not start the race.
On the first lap, the safety car came on track. Maldonado hit the barrier and as a misfortune never comes alone, the other Lotus (Grosjean) also retired.
Verstappen (lap 34) and Raikkönen (lap 42) also retired.
Mercedes dominated the race from start to finish with Hamilton in first and Rosberg in second.
Vettel on his debut with Ferrari was 3rd and the team returned to the podium (the last time had been in Hungary in 2014).
Massa was 4th and Sauber who last year did not score, have opened this season with 14 points, thanks to the 5th place of Nasr and the 8th place of Ericsson.
Force India starts with 7 points (Hülkenberg was 7th and Pérez 10th).
Ricciardo had a discreet race, having finished in 6th and the rookie Sainz finished in 9th place, scoring 2 points for Toro Rosso.
McLaren-Honda was a huge disappointment. In qualifying, they were the slowest team and today with Magnussen out, Button was the only driver outside the points as he finished in 11th place.
Where’s the next race? Malaysia in 15 days from now.
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