Australian Grand Prix LIVE: Lap-by-lap updates from year’s first race

He’s taken the victory by almost four seconds over teammate Kimi Antonelli, with Charles Leclerc in third after surviving a desperate charge from Lewis Hamilton over the last lap.

That wasn’t as easy for the Silver Arrows as most thought it would be, with Leclerc leading after a dynamite start and running with Russell for the first 20-odd laps.

Regardless, Mercedes have stamped themselves as the class of the field. Teams will need to develop like crazy and race perfectly to trouble them on this form.

After a fine drive full of eye-catching overtakes as he went from 18th on the grid to sixth, you’d think Max Verstappen would be a happy man.

He’s not.

Asked if he enjoyed the race, the Red Bull star shot back with, ‘No, not really.

‘The overtakes were fun but I’m also racing cars that are two seconds slower.

‘We had too much deg [tyre degredation] … the two hard compounds didn’t work for us. We had a lot of graining and needed a two-stop.’

The seven-time world champion – and all the Tifosi around the world – were gutted after last year’s Australian Grand Prix, when he finished 10th with Leclerc eighth. It was the first of many failures for the Prancing Horse, leaving Hamilton to remark ‘I lost sight of who I was’ once the season was done.

After this year’s chequered flag fell, he was upbeat and raring to keep bringing the fight to Mercedes after the team’s impressive showing.

‘I’m genuinely really proud of the team. I think we’ve done an amazing job to get the car to where it is,’ he said.

‘Of course, we’re not as fast as Mercedes, we’ve got work to do, but we’re right in the fight and it was a really, really fun race and it felt good for me also.

‘A couple more laps and I would’ve had Charles, so I had great pace.

‘Lots and lots of positives to take from today.’

The newlywed had an electric start that saw him grab the lead into turn one, then mix it up with Russell until the first virtual safety car – when Ferrari made a strategy mistake by not pitting either driver.

‘The person who has been switching on the lights [at starts] has been quite cheeky because for the start of the season for these cars to go so quick lights off, I think it took everybody by surprise,’ Leclerc said.

‘It was a fun first half of the race and P3 was the best we could do today.’

Despite the win, the Mercedes star had some misgivings about how the cars behaved.

‘We had the suspicion hat it was going to be a bit of a yo-yo effect. As soon as one of us got in front, it was impossible to hold it,’ he said.

‘Obviously with this straight mode we lose a lot of front end on the cars, so we’re sort of understeering a lot around these corners.

‘Maybe the FIA are going to have to improve that a little bit because it was a bit sketchy, but I made it in one piece.’

Hats off to Max Verstappen for flying up from 18th on the grid to finish sixth, albeit a worrying 54 seconds behind Russell.

And congratulations to Arvid Lindblad, who finished eighth and collected points in his first grand prix.

‘It was a hell of a fight at the beginning,’ he told Jenson Button.

‘I made a bad start, and [had] some really tight battles with Charles at the start.

‘Just really glad to cross the finish line.’

When the top three drivers were in the cool-down room, Russell admitted he ‘screwed up’ by forgetting to press his overtake button. He also repeated what he said on radio just before the lights went out to get the race underway – he didn’t get enough charge into his battery, contributing to Leclerc’s brilliant effort to take the lead off the line.

‘You guys weren’t slow, you guys were not slow,’ the Briton tells Leclerc.

The trophy presentation is run and done, with Russell leaping into the air from top spot on the podium as he receives his trophy.

The Aussie left his fans absolutely gutted by binning his McLaren on the reconnaissance lap.

‘A scenario like that just shouldn’t happen, so it’s obviously very disappointing,’ he said.

‘We had a couple of things going on but I think the first part I want to stress is that there is certainly a big element of it that was me.

‘Cold tyres, I have used that exit kerb every lap of the weekend, but maybe I didn’t have to.’

Piastri suggested that the incident was somewhat related to battling with F1’s new regulations, but said there was no mechanical fault with his car.

‘The difficult part to take with that is everything was working normally,’ Piastri said.

‘I was backwards before I’d really even had a chance to react. It happened pretty quick.

‘But obviously crashing out of the race trying to get to the race is the situation that we were in.’

That was George Russell on the team radio as he took the win with a stellar drive in a car that appears strong in every area, not just the engine.

1. Russell

2. Antonelli

3. Leclerc

4. Hamilton

5. Norris

6. Verstappen

7. Bearman

8. Lindblad

9. Bortoleto

10. Gasly

11. Ocon

12. Albon

13. Lawson

14. Colapinto

15. Sainz

16. Perez