Formula One Features — March 2019

With the Australian Grand Prix providing some unexpected results, we head into the second race of the season with even more questions than answers in our minds. Flying into Melbourne we all had about 30 hours in planes and transit airports to anticipate what was going to happen, but I bet no one expected an easy Mercedes one-two and even fewer predicted Valtteri Bottas would completely dominate the race to earn his fourth Grand Prix victory.

Mercedes has won all five championships held since the Hybrid Power Units came into Formula One, with Lewis Hamilton securing four championships in the same period of time, but that doesn’t mean all other teams and drivers could stay home in 2019 as if they had no chance to compete. Given the high level achieved by Ferrari at the start of 2018 and Red Bull’s performance in the last third of that season, there’s reason to believe the German team will have to work very hard this year to retain its titles.