Something that was very high up on my list of priorities whilst here in Australia was to go to the Melbourne Grand Prix, so I did. Easily the coldest and wettest experience I've had in Australia but definitely one of the best.
I was surprised at how accessible everything was. I only had a General Admission ticket which would allow me into most areas but I was surprised to find that I could actually get pretty much anywhere. There was a bar right next to the main straight that I thought you would surely have to be VIP to enter but no, i walked right in. I even managed to sneak into nearly all of the grandstands around the circuit over the course of the weekend (not on race day, obviously). You can't visit the pit areas of the F1 teams but you can for all of the support races including V8 races, porsche, celebrity and historic races.
Porsche garages
There were a few races in each support category over the weekend but the biggest of these was the V8 races which is a much bigger deal than I realised, especially here in Australia, they go mental for it. For most of the support races I just wanted to see people crash as I didn't really have much interest in them but I found myself getting really into the V8 races.
Back of the V8 garages
V8 racing
There was so much other stuff going on besides what was on the track. I found myself constantly looking at the schedule to make sure I could see everything that I wanted to see. There was a live action area which had repeat performances on all weekend. One of the acts was this guy that flew around on this big pendulum type thing doing tricks. There was a massive inflatable thing that you could launch yourself onto from a 10 metre board if you had the nerve. The biggest of these performances was the Nitro Circus where they do all kinds of tricks on anything with two wheels. There main show was to be the headline act on Sunday after the race but the weather meant they had to tone it down a little.
Nitro Circus
One of the highlights of the whole race weekend came on the Thursday at the autograph stage where all the F1 drivers showed there faces. I have no use for a piece of paper with a famous persons name on it so I just camped out in front of the stage rather than in a very long queue. I couldn't believe how close I got to all the drivers. I've seen them so many times over the years on TV and here they were less than 5 metres away. I saw all the big names: Vettel, Webber, Alonso, Button, Hamilton. It was a shame Schumacher retired because that would have been amazing. Vettel got a suitable booing from the Aussie crowd but I'm sure that's nothing to the treatment he'll get next year after what he did to Webber in Malaysia the following week.
Aussie Ledge!
British Ledge!
Pair of....ledges
The following day at the Autograph stage the celebs from the Celebrity Mazda races had their turn. There was only a couple of names I recognized. One of them was Chris Tarrant and I'm not particularly bothered about seeing him but the other was Sir Chris Hoy, a true legend in sport and I had to go and see him!
An actual Sir
As if there wasn't already enough going on I look upwards and see there's all kinds of crazy stuff going on in the sky as well! The Australian equivalent of the Red Arrows were on everyday of the weekend, a jet fighter made everyone wet themselves every now and again by flying over the track and a few minutes before the race a huge jumbo jet made a pass.
I can see you
Where's the airport?!
Ahhh the weather. Thursday: Gorgeous, got sun burnt. Friday: A bit cloudy, still got burnt. Saturday: pneumonia! It was bloody freezing! I was watching Free Practice 3 when the meanest looking cloud rolled in from behind the stand and soaked everyone underneath it.
I think it might rain
I had a jacket on but it wasn't enough for the deluge that came. It was only 15C which is bloody freezing when you've spent over 6 months in +30C. I tried to take some videos of the first part of Qualifying but my hands were shaking so much that they are barely watchable. Q2 got postponed for 10 minutes to let the rain pass and the track to dry out. It did neither of those things and the marshals started sweeping the standing water. Another 10 minutes and then another 20 before they called it quits and decided to run Qualifying in the morning before the race.
A tad wet
Where I hid waiting for Qualifying to resume
I came prepared for race day which was the day with the worst weather forecast. I heard an Aussie say behind me that there has never been a wet race in Australia before but I put on my bin liner full of confidence that I was as prepared as I could be for the onslaught. It was dry all day! Still it protected me against the wind which was bitter.
Prepared!
I got there early and picked the best spot I could find which I had scoped out over the past few days and sat there for 8 hours waiting for the race to start. Sounds bad but there was still lots going on. There was the rest of the postponed qualifying and a few more support races.
One thing that was particular interesting was the Speed Comparison Test where an F1 car was pitted against a V8 race car and a normal road sports car. They set off about a minute apart and all crossed the line at the same time.
Speed Comparison Test
The excitement built throughout the day especially when this Italian lot got out the banner and their beers. A few more jet passes and the drivers parade and it was time to race!
Well said!
Drivers parade
I bought I portable radio so I could try and stay in touch with what was happening in the race. There was the big screen right in front of us but you don't always get the full story so I turned it up as loud as it would go and jammed in ear phones hard into my ears and tried my best to listen. It was difficult to say the least but if I kept hold of the ear phones I could just about make out what they were saying.
Racing
I think it was an exciting race but having never been to a race before it was hard to tell if it really was or not. Raikkonen won the race with Alonso 2nd and Vettel in 3rd.
Before the race they had shown a notice saying do not enter the track until the safety car had been past showing a green light. So I positioned myself as close to a gap in the fence as I could get and jumped over as soon as the car went past. I must have been the 5th person onto the track but that finishing straight is longer that it looks on TV! It nearly killed me running down to the podium! I swear I was having a heart attack whilst they were lifting their trophies.
Winner!
Martin Brundle = Ledge!
Sky team
Ted talking to Christian Horner
Best day ever
The pits
As night began to fall and the mass dismantle of everything began the security seemed to become a bit lax. All the places you not allowed to go before suddenly I could walk right in without anyone stopping me. It became a game of how far can I go into F1s inner circle before someone stopped me. In the VIP section there was a small stand of seats where people were waiting to get autographs of people. I walked right in front of that and decided to hang around where all the famous people were getting into the cars. There were a few old race drives including Niki Lauda. I thought I might hand around for someone like Bernie but I was exhausted so I went home.
Pretending I'm a VIP
What a weekend! I'm so glad that I've finally been to a Formula 1 Grand Prix and I think that it was even more special because it was in Melbourne. I really hope to go again and even see another one somewhere else. I plan to go to Kuala Lumper next year where the tickets a dirt cheap and I mean ridiculously cheap. (£15 for a weekend ticket!)
I took a lot of videos this weekend so I decided to make a video montage. Its awesome!
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