Brawn Again

Jenson has done it, the widely acclaimed favourite to win here in Australia has taken pole with team mate Barrichello completing the front row.

Brawn GP were simply sensational on their debut, backing up their initial practice and qualifying promise to take a surprise lead in F1.

Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel and BMW Sauber’s Robert Kubica will make up the second role.

World Champion Lewis was left in the dust with a 15th position out of 20 as McLaren continued their dismal form. Lack of drive in the gearbox was blamed for a lack of speed. It looks very likely that he won’t win here tomorrow like he did in his Championship winning season.

Brawn GP pole position is a first for a brand new team since Scotland’s Jackie Stewart for Tyrrell at the Canadian GP in 1970.

And now the team has the backing of Sir Richard Branson’s money to fulfil their promise throughout the season. The team will soon be named Virgin BGP 001.

The top end of the field was two tenths of a second and shows early indication how close the race could be.

Let us hope for a thriller.

Nico Fastest!

What a baffling day in the first practice of the season.

Nico Rosberg was the fastest in both sessions in Australia for Williams, and who would have thought it?

This was certainly an interesting and intriguing day, Toyota, Brawn GP and Williams, who all initially fought off Thursday’s protest about diffusers, were extremely impressive and quick.

The fastest drivers of the day were unfamiliar - Rosberg, Barrichello, Trulli, Webber, Button, Glock, Nakajima, Vettel, Sutil (How was that possible?) and last year’s runner up Massa all make up the top ten.

Not a McLaren nor a World Champion insight. Hamilton, Raikkonen and Alonso were nowhere to be seen.

These protests against rear diffusers will hopefully run out of steam, the complaints were ignored that the cars using them were not up F1 regulations, although an appeal hearing is due shortly to ban them.

And those cars that can boost the diffusers, at the moment, were the fastest around Melbourne’s Albert Park street circuit, no doubt, Ferrari will kick a fuss and the diffusers will probably be branded illegal soon enough.

So it still begs the question whether these surprising front-runners are actually legit. I do hope they are.

Brawn GP showed why they could be consider as favourites clocking notable times, three weeks ago the team never existed. Perhaps Jenson may appear from Hamilton’s rather large shadow to lead the way for the Brits and fulfil his potential that has been left wanting recently.

Hamilton looked completely astounded, he has even said the dreaded ‘still come good’ line. McLaren will need to find a fix and fast just to keep up. They were completely off the boil.

Qualifying will definitely be interesting.