2009 AUSTRALIAN GRAND PRIX

Background

The Grand Prix was contested by 20 drivers, in 10 teams of two. The teams, also known as constructors , were Ferrari , McLaren - Mercedes , Renault , Brawn -Mercedes, Force India -Mercedes, BMW Sauber , Toyota , Red Bull Racing -Renault, Williams -Toyota and Toro Rosso -Ferrari.

Practice and qualifying

"In both sessions sector two was working particularly well. There are only two 'real' corners in the sector, but it's really interesting and it feels good in the car. The FW31 is well balanced all round the track, but seems even more so there than in any other places. After a winter of testing, it's good to get out on a new, fresh track and we seem to be in a better position than we thought."

Race

Rosberg was again the pace-setter in the second practice session, with a time some six-tenths of a second faster than what he achieved during the first 90-minute session. This time, Barrichello was second in his Brawn with the Toyota of Jarno Trulli in third. This marked an improvement for Trulli as he was only 12th in the first session. The only Australian in the field, Mark Webber ended up fourth for Red Bull Racing, ahead of Button, Glock and Nakajima. Webber's teammate Sebastia... Rosberg completed a clean sweep of top spots in practice, by coming fastest in Saturday's practice session. His time edged out Trulli's Toyota by just three thousandths of a second. Button was third, and the only other driver to break into the 1:25 lap times, just under two-tenths of a second behind Rosberg. Massa improved again to end up fourth, and be the only driver from McLaren or Ferrari to finish in the top ten. Nakajima again impressed in the Williams, finishing fifth, in fr... "The last five or six months for both of us have been so tough because of going from not having a drive or any future in racing to putting it on pole here is just amazing, it really is and I have got to give all credit to the team and Ross [Brawn] and Nick [Fry] for making this happen. This is where we deserve to be after the tough times we have had." Further down the field, reigning champion Hamilton was progressing through the field having started eighteenth. After the first corner incident, he moved up to 13th at the end of the first lap. He passed Bourdais for 12th on lap two, Fisichella for 11th on lap three, and broke into the top ten, after passing Buemi on lap four. Out front, Button was beginning to establish a lead of over four seconds by the time he set the fastest lap on lap six, with a lap of 1:28.787. Vettel... On lap ten, Rosberg attempted a move on Räikkönen into turn one, and succeeded to move up into fifth place on track. In the process, Räikkönen was slowed up by the German's move, allowing Barrichello to close up on the straight that leads into Turn 3. The Brawn car closed up thanks to picking up the slipstream, but even this left him several car lengths behind the Ferrari as they entered the braking zone for the corner. Barrichello's car snaked under brakes, and clipped the back of Räikkö... Massa and Hamilton both pitted on lap eleven, with both drivers changing from the option tyres, moving onto the harder rubber. This allowed for a scrap for third to begin between Kubica, Rosberg and Barrichello to occur, as the latter two had caught up on the Pole. It would only last one lap however, as Kubica pitted on lap twelve, the final driver to change his first stint super-softs. Out front, Button continued to lead by 4.3 seconds from Vettel with Rosberg third,... On lap 18, whilst running in fourth place, Nakajima ran slightly wide on the exit of Turn 4 and proceeding to put too much power down spinning the car sideways and head on into the wall between Turns 4 and 5. After hitting the wall, his front wing ended up in the middle of the track and directly on the racing line. Button made his pit stop a lap later, and exited pit lane as the safety car was deployed. After the field cycled through, the safety car eventually picked up Button and ... At the restart, Button held position out front, ahead of Vettel, Massa, Kubica – who was still weaving his car to get temperature into his tyres after he had crossed the start/finish line – and Räikkönen. In a battle for sixth, Piquet had lined up a move on sixth-placed Rosberg, causing the German to defend on the inside. However, Piquet lost control of his car under braking – and possibly due to the tyres not being up to the required temperature – and spun off into the turn one gravel and out o... Kubica pitted from third place on lap 39, and rejoined the circuit in seventh, just behind Hamilton, who was still making his way up the field. At the same time, Räikkönen made his second stop and rejoined in ninth. Buemi had quietly made his way up into fourth place, just in front of the Brit, before he made his second and final pit stop on lap 41. Two laps later, Räikkönen made an error whilst exiting Turn 13, and spun off, glancing the wall on the right hand side. ... Rosberg and Vettel pitted on consecutive laps, trying to limit the amount of time that they would have to spend on the super-soft tyre. Both drivers held station in seventh and second positions respectively. At this time, Massa was slowly exiting the race with suspension damage, limping round before retiring the Ferrari in pit lane. Button pitted for the final time on lap 47, and suffered a very slow stop, with a sticking left rear wheel change, with the pit stop lasting 13.2 seconds. [ 2... Lap 56 saw Vettel make a slight mistake in Turn 1, and allowed Kubica to make a run down the outside, towards Turn 3. Vettel braked early and Kubica was ahead turning in. However, Vettel turned in and his front wing locked onto the sidepod of Kubica's BMW. Due to this collision, both cars lost their front wings, but they carried on towards Turns 4 and 5. Kubica was ahead, but without downforce he understeered off the circuit into the wall and out of the race. Meanwhile, Vettel also made an error... As stated by Article 40.14 of the sporting regulations for Formula One, the safety car pulled in and the drivers proceeded over the line without overtaking. Button secured a debut victory for Brawn after leading the race from start to finish. He led home teammate Barrichello as they completed a Brawn one-two. Trulli finished third although there were accusations that he passed Hamilton under the safety car. This would later turn out to be true, and he was penalised twenty-five seco... "We have worked incredibly hard for this victory today and to see the dedication, commitment and sheer hard work come to fruition with Jenson and Rubens bringing home a one-two finish for Brawn GP at the first race of the season is immensely rewarding. After everything that our team has been through over the past four months, this is quite simply a sensational result. It is just the beginning for us and it wasn't a perfect race by any means so we will learn from today and continue to improve. We... The top three finishers on the road appeared on the podium and in the subsequent press conference , where Button reflected on a somewhat easy race, in which he led all 58 laps, although it was not without its problems: "The first few laps of the race were great for me and I could settle into a pace, but then when the safety car came out I struggled massively to get heat into the tyres. The car was hitting the ground and just before the safety car pulled in I flat-spotted the tyre pretty severely... Barrichello picked up his first podium since the 2008 British Grand Prix , and his highest finish since the now-infamous 2005 United States Grand Prix , in which only the six Bridgestone-shod cars started due to safety concerns with Michelin 's tyres. He praised the strength of his Brawn car, as he was involved in several incidents during the race. He also reflected upon his fluffed start, which ultimately led to the first of his incidents, at Turn 1. "I hit anti-stall , so the car went into neu... Trulli was pleased with his third place on the road, but was however, unaware of the penalty that he was due to receive for his late race pass of Hamilton under the safety car. "Well, after yesterday's disappointment this was a great day, especially for my team. I started from the pit and I was lucky enough to get away from the first corner accident. From that time on I was just pushing, pushing, pushing really hard because the car was good." After an investigation, stewards deemed that Sebastian Vettel was in the wrong after his collision with Robert Kubica, which resulted in both of them not finishing the race. Vettel received a fine and a 10-place grid penalty to be applied in the following round in Malaysia . Red Bull Racing, Vettel's team, also received a $ 50,000 fine for letting him continue with a damaged car, for over a lap. The Trulli/Hamilton case was reopened to examine new evidence, and both drivers were summoned to a stewards' inquiry on 2 April 2009, prior to the Malaysian Grand Prix. McLaren continued to insist it had not given orders to allow Trulli past, even after being played an audio recording of such an instruction over team radio. Hamilton, as well, continued to assert his false statement. The stewards decided that Hamilton and McLaren had misled them, having contradicted the available evidence....

Classification

Cars that used the KERS system are marked with "‡"

External links

37°50′59″S 144°58′06″E / 37.84972°S 144.96833°E / -37.84972; 144.96833