As David Coulthard says: “Melbourne is always a popular destination because you’re pretty much in the heart of the city which makes it very easy to access the facilities and really creates a party atmosphere.”

It’s a park circuit used just once a year for racing. Track conditions change a lot, which means it can be difficult to work out how to set up the car for Sunday afternoon’s race, based on what happens in Friday practice. But by the time Qualifying starts on Saturday afternoon, all becomes clear. The track stays ‘green’ (slippery) all the time off the racing line, which means it is not a good circuit for overtaking.

With the race taking place just as the seasons are changing, the temperature can be quite variable, so it can be a struggle to get tyres up to working temperature or a struggle to cool the car. And as well as the Formula One there’s one of the best support programmes seen all season. Even the most seasoned of F1 personnel is impressed by the sound of those V8s…

Here’s our guide to the circuit and track:

Australian Basics
• F1 grands prix in Australia have been run 24 times – in Adelaide from 1985-’95 and then Melbourne, where it’s remained ever since.
• Michael Schumacher has won here more times than any other driver, climbing the top step of the podium four times – in 2000, 2001, 2002 and 2004. The only other man to match that feat was Lex Davison who won four times in the ‘50s and ‘60s when it was a non-championship race.
• Red Bull Racing’s Mark Webber made a memorable F1 debut here in 2002, scoring two points after navigating his uncompetitive Minardi (the precursor to Scuderia Toro Rosso) safely through a series of on-track mishaps to take fifth.
• The 1991 race in Adelaide goes down as the shortest race in F1 history. Torrential rain and concerns over safety, with a number of drivers refusing to race, led to the grand prix being stopped after just 14 laps.
• Melbourne switched to a ‘twilight’ start last year in a bid to boost TV ratings in Europe. It’s the same this year with the race getting underway at 5pm on Sunday.
• Rubens Barrichello will be the only driver on this year’s grid to have raced at every grand prix staged in Melbourne since 1996.
• In Melbourne, the pole to win ratio is at 50 per cent, though in the past three races the pole-winner has taken victory – Jenson Button, Lewis Hamilton and Kimi Raikkonen.
• However, in the first five Melbourne races the pole-winner failed to win on every occasion bar one – Mika Hakkinen in 1998.
• The lap record of 1:24.125 is held by Michael Schumacher (2004).

Albert Park Analysis
• Albert Park is a temporary circuit, so expect plenty of spins and offs in practice as the track ‘rubbers in’. Even on race day it’s tricky and last year most teams opted to keep their stints on the supersoft tyre as short as possible as tyre wear was a continual problem.
• Melbourne has a short pit lane (in past seasons the average entry to exit time is 23-24 seconds) but expect that to drop this year with no refuelling.
• Accidents are commonplace in Melbourne, owing to the slippery track and over eagerness in the first turn. Since 2002, there have been 11 safety car deployments in eight races making the track the most likely on the calendar to see a safety car intervention.

Last Year
• Melbourne, then the traditional season opener, hosted F1’s first ‘twilight race’. But as the light around the circuit dipped it was Jenson Button who shone, his Brawn GP team the unexpected class of the field. The Briton led away from pole and was untroubled throughout the race to take his second career win and set himself on the road to a first title. Behind him, team-mate Rubens Barrichello got involved in all sorts of trouble after a startline near-stall, clipping Mark Webber and having to fight back from midfield to claim an eventual second, his highest finish for four years. It was only achieved, though, after Sebastian Vettel, on course for second, tangled with BMW-Sauber’s Robert Kubica on the final lap, an accident that ruled them both out and allowed Barrichello to seal a Brawn one-two, with Jarno Trulli taking third.

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