AUSTRALIAN GRAND PRIX CHAOS AS MAX VERSTAPPEN LOSES CONTROL AND MULTIPLE CARS ALMOST CRASH
Max Verstappen suffered a big moment in FP1 as Red Bull showed cracks in their dominance at the Australian Grand Prix. Verstappen lost control of his car towards the end of the first practice session, looping around at turn four after running wide.
He was left in a plume of smoke but avoided the walls and was able to continue. The Dutchman appeared to be frustrated at the incident, moaning at the mistake over team radio as it ruined his programme.
He said: "Ah these tyres are completely **** now." Red Bull continued to set the pace in Albert Park with Verstappen topping the timesheets.
He was a big four-tenths faster than Lewis Hamilton's Mercedes with Sergio Perez third and Fernando Alonso in P4. However, former F1 world champion Jenson Button has claimed the team don't look as comfortable as they did at previous race weekends.
He told Sky Sports F1: "Yeah they're quick but it doesn't look easy steel. The car looks really edgy. We saw Max off the circuit on a few occasions and Checo through the gravel so its still not going to be straightforward for them and some of it is the wind.
"That car, the way it works, it has to be on the edge, you need a bit of oversteer for it to work." And FP1 was also plagued with a series of GPS issues which forced the session to be red-flagged.
Ted Kravitz opened up on the problems and explained why practice had been stopped. It came after multiple cars almost came together because the GPS system was unable to inform them about the cars ahead of them on track.
He commented: "It's the processing element between all those GPS signals that come into Formula One and getting them distributed amongst the teams.
"I think that element of it has gone down although that's certainly what the teams think is the issue. We are getting a line from the FIA, confirmation from the FIA. 'There is a GPS problem.
"'The red flag is necessary for safety reasons with teams unable to monitor car position and closing speed'." It was a chaotic session with a range of other cars also suffering from incidents on the quick street circuit.
Yuki Tsunoda had a close call halfway through the session with the AlphaTauri star completely out of shape in turn one. The Japanese star lost the back end when turning into the left-hander and was lucky to avoid the wall.