Charles Leclerc lead from start to finish to become the first Ferrari driver to win the Australian Grand Prix since 2018 on Sunday. PHOTO: Ferrari

BRENDAN LINES APRIL 10, 2022

FERRARI painted Melbourne red when Charles Leclerc led from start to finish winning the Australian Grand Prix at Albert Park on Sunday.

The Monegasque was class-of-the-field, becoming the first Ferrari driver since Sebastian Vettel in 2018 to win the race, extending his world championship lead to 34 points.

A record-breaking 419,114 fans flocked over the four days, eclipsing the previous record of 401,000 set at Melbourne’s first event in 1996.

Leclerc withstood sustained pressure from Red Bull’s Max Verstappen while having the advantage of his lead cut back by two safety cars.

But the late afternoon sun shone on the 24-year-old’s race when Verstappen’s race abruptly ended — the second Red Bull car to retire from power-unit failure in three races — on Lap 39.

Breezing to a 20-second lead over Verstappen’s teammate Sergio Perez, Leclerc saluted the flag with the fastest lap of the race in his pocket.

Conversely, Leclerc’s teammate Carlos Sainz capped off a disastrous weekend by spinning off on the exit of the high-speed chicane  at Turn 9-10 on Lap 3, triggering the first safety car of the race.

After the race restart on Lap 6, Verstappen was then troubled by a graining front right-medium tyre on Lap 12, five laps earlier than the tyre’s predicted lifespan.

Ferrari played tactics pushing Verstappen into a corner to stay out on track rather than pit and lose track position, on Lap 19 Red Bull blinked first to go onto the hard tyre.

It was a day of silver service for the Mercedes pair of Lewis Hamilton and George Russell, after a weekend dogged by tyre temperature issues.

Russell benefited from a pit stop under the second safety car — triggered by Sebastian Vettel’s exit from the race on Lap 24 — to gain track position over Hamilton and snaring an unlikely podium finish, a first for Russell with the team.

Surprisingly, Russell’s podium and Hamilton’s P4 means Mercedes leave Albert Park as the leader of the constructors championship. 

Their race pace was on song leapfrogging ahead of Lando Norris in P4 at the start and kept a resurgent Fernando Alonso playing a long game on the harder tyre behind them.

Despite losing ground at the start, both the McLaren’s of Lando Norris and hometown hero Daniel Ricciardo recovered to P5 and P6 respectively, consolidating the team’s first double-points finish for the season.