2011 Australian Grand Prix

Entrants

This race marks the Formula One debut of Sergio Pérez, driving for Sauber.

Hispania Racing did not complete FP1, spending most of the day building their cars. Their 2011-specification front wing failed a mandatory crash test, forcing them to use the 2010 wing — not designed to work with their new aerodynamic package — for the entire weekend.

Daniel Ricciardo drives for Toro Rosso in place of Jaime Alguersuari in FP1. Karun Chandhok runs for Lotus in place of Jarno Trulli. Nico Hülkenberg drives for Force India in place of Paul di Resta.

Tyre choices

Pirelli brings the silver-banded hard compound as the prime tyre and the yellow-banded soft as the option — the same selection Bridgestone brought to Melbourne in 2010. It is Pirelli’s first competitive race weekend supplying Formula One since 1991.

Practice

Red Bull led FP1, with Mark Webber three tenths ahead of Sebastian Vettel and almost a second clear of Fernando Alonso. Vettel suffered a blistered front tyre that briefly raised concerns over the Pirelli compounds, but was later identified as a phenomenon seen in winter testing rather than a structural failure. Karun Chandhok crashed on his installation lap at turn three, the first car onto the circuit; the team attributed it to driver error and the damage was minimal enough to allow Jarno Trulli to return for FP2. Several other drivers — Massa, Petrov, Rosberg — went wide into the gravel at the same corner.

Conditions in the Friday sessions were unlike anything experienced in winter testing: low temperatures, variable winds and intermittent afternoon showers kept track temperatures consistently below 20 °C. With the Pirelli rubber demanding a much narrower temperature window than the Bridgestone tyres of 2010, the teams struggled to find the optimal performance band all day. The final 30 minutes of FP2 were run as a DRS simulation to verify the system worked correctly, meaning no clean lap times were set during that period.

Vitantonio Liuzzi completed just one installation lap in FP2; Narain Karthikeyan did not go out. In FP3 Karthikeyan set a time some 14 seconds off Vettel’s pace, and Liuzzi lost all drive on his installation lap and was towed back in. Williams experienced delays when a gearbox problem kept Rubens Barrichello in the garage, and Pastor Maldonado spun off and could not rejoin.

Heading into the race, Vettel had won three of the last four Grands Prix of the 2010 season (retiring from the lead of the one he did not win) and was crowned champion in Abu Dhabi.