Rule changes will affect driver style and car performance with world champion Lando Norris already under scrutiny
W
ith the long and increasingly febrile buildup almost at an end, Formula One is finally ready to go racing into the sport’s new era. Whether it will prove a success is one of many questions that will be answered at the season-opener in Melbourne this weekend, as will the most pressing concern: which team and driver enter this brave new world on top of the pile?
In the paddock at Albert Park this week, teams and drivers increasingly had an air of the stony-faced stare-down of a cold war summit amid caginess about their prospects. No one wanted to give anything away nor make predictions.
None of which has done anything to temper the palpable sense of excitement and anticipation in Melbourne, where the city is abuzz in the Victoria sunshine as fans flock to Albert Park. The genteel signs encouraging players to replace their divots on the park’s golf course, across which one of the many huge, vibrant fan areas sits, are dwarfed by huge banners of drivers, stages with bands and DJs around which fans congregate to eat and drink. A chicken schnitzel joint, the wonderfully named Schnitty Schnitty Bang Bang, has been doing a roaring trade.
