Scott Gulbransen
The 2026 F1 season was supposed to start with chaos. New regulations, unfamiliar cars and an overhauled power unit formula meant the doomsayers had a field day in the weeks leading up to Melbourne. What they got instead was one of the more compelling season openers in recent memory, and two teams that separated themselves from the rest of the field as if they were racing in a different series.
Mercedes and Ferrari weren’t just good in Australia. They were in a class of their own. When the dust settled at Albert Park, the Silver Arrows had a 1-2 finish and the Scuderia had P3 and P4. Everyone else was left to sort out the scraps. Here’s who had reason to smile — and who’s already scrambling.
Winner: The Race Start | A Beautiful Mess That Wasn’t Messy At All
Going in, the biggest unknown wasn’t which team had the fastest car. It was whether anyone would actually make it through Turn 1 without wrecking. The 2026 regulations introduced a radically different starting procedure — drivers receive a five-second warning via blue flashing panels instead of the traditional lights — and a lot of smart people spent a lot of time warning F1 that things could go sideways in a hurry.
They didn’t. What fans got instead was a genuinely spectacular opening sequence. Charles Leclerc launched from fourth on the grid and was already leading before most people had time to process what happened. George Russell found himself holding off a charging Lewis Hamilton while simultaneously chasing down the Ferrari in front. Multiple position changes in the first two laps, actual wheel-to-wheel contact between cars that matter, all in the era of spec-adjacent racing and processions, this felt alive.
The new regulations didn’t produce a safety headache. They produced a race.
Winner: George Russell | Mercedes
“Feeling incredible. It was a hell of a fight at the beginning. We knew it was going to be challenging. I got on the grid, I saw my battery level, I had nothing in the tank, made a bad start, and then obviously had some really tight battles with Charles, so I was really glad to cross the finish line,” your winner George Russell said after he won the Australian Grand Prix.
That’s what winning the first race of a new F1 era sounds like. Russell came into 2026 as the bookmakers’ favorite for the championship, a tag he wore gracefully and then went out and justified it on Sunday. He took pole, survived a chaotic early battle with Leclerc, executed a brilliant one-stop strategy, and crossed the line 2.9 seconds ahead of his teammate.
“That wasn’t a straightforward afternoon, but this win feels very sweet.”
It wasn’t just the win. The way Russell managed the Leclerc threat in those opening laps, trading positions, preserving tires, staying out of trouble, showed maturity. Mercedes had the faster car, yes, but Russell still had to drive it. He did.
Winner: Kimi Antonelli | Mercedes
Stop and appreciate what this kid pulled off over 48 hours in Melbourne. He wrecked his car in the final practice session Saturday morning. His mechanics had hours to rebuild it from what looked like a total loss. Then he qualified second, got sent to the stewards twice over separate incidents, and still finished second in the race after dropping to seventh at the start. He spent the middle portion of the afternoon methodically picking his way back through traffic.
“It was very intense, I was very nervous, very stressed going into the session because at one point it looked like I couldn’t make it… We couldn’t even set up the car, we just went out of the garage.”
Nineteen years old. Second place in his first race of a brand-new regulation era. Mercedes has a problem and the problem is that both of their drivers are very, very good.
Winner: Charles Leclerc | Ferrari
He started fourth. He led after the first corner. That’s not luck, that’s the Ferrari SF-26’s launch system doing something the rest of the field simply can’t match right now, combined with a driver who knows exactly how to exploit it.
Leclerc kept Russell honest for the better part of 15 laps, swapping the lead back and forth in a way that made the Albert Park grandstands genuinely loud. The strategy call that ultimately cost Ferrari a potential win wasn’t his fault (that’s a team decision we’ll get to) and third place in a race where Mercedes had a clear performance edge is a result Ferrari can build on.
The car is real. Leclerc is real. The gap to the Mercedes exists, but it’s not the kind of gap that gets you reaching for the white flag.
Winner: Lewis Hamilton | Ferrari
He started seventh. By the first corner he was third. That alone tells you something about where Hamilton is mentally in year two with Ferrari compared to the difficult slog that was 2025.
The strategy kept him out of the podium picture and staying out through both Virtual Safety Car periods backfired when Mercedes’ tire life proved unexpectedly long, but Hamilton wasn’t hiding anything after the race.
“I feel great. I feel like I could have kept going. I wish the race was longer. Another five laps or so, I think I would have got third,” Hamilton said. “There’s lots of positives but we have a lot of work to do to catch Mercedes but it’s not impossible. I believe we can close the gap.”
That second quote matters. A year ago, Hamilton was visibly deflated after races that didn’t go to plan. This version sounds like someone who has rediscovered why he does this. Ferrari fourth in Melbourne with pace to spare is a very different situation than where the Scuderia was at this time last season.
Loser: Oscar Piastri | McLaren
There’s no gentle way to write this one. Oscar Piastri crashed out of his home race before the formation lap was even complete. He clipped the curb at Turn 4, lost control, and that was it. The car into the wall, the home crowd in stunned silence, the season start reduced to zero points on home soil.
Having qualified 5th, he was on his way to the grid when he took too much curb and crashed into the barriers.
It gets worse when you consider the context. McLaren came into 2026 as the defending constructors’ champion. The new regulations were always going to be a challenge to navigate — customer Mercedes power units mean the gap to the works team is real — but losing your Australian driver at his home race before the lights even go out is the kind of start that takes weeks to shake off. Lando Norris finished 5th, which tells the full story of where McLaren sits right now.
Loser: Ferrari Strategy | Ferrari
The car is good. The strategy department had a tough afternoon. When the first Virtual Safety Car came out, triggered by Isack Hadjar’s Red Bull retirement, both Leclerc and Hamilton stayed out while Mercedes pitted. Ferrari thought it was too early for a one-stop strategy to work. They were wrong.
Ferrari opted to leave both drivers out. Then, when they eventually pitted under normal racing conditions, they lost a huge amount of time and were therefore jumped by Antonelli.
A second VSC then came out, and Ferrari couldn’t even take advantage of that one as the pit lane entry had already closed. They went from holding a 1-2 to finishing 3-4 and the distinction feels significant when you’re chasing a team that just executed its pit stops perfectly and drove off into the distance. Ferrari knows it. The team said after the race they know where they need to improve. The car deserves better decisions than it got on Sunday.
