For those who prefer their race classifications with full names instead of driver abbreviations that’s:

1. Rosberg
2. Hamilton
3. Vettel
4. Ricciardo
5. Massa
6. Grosjean
7. Hulkenberg
8. Votta
9. Sainz
10. Verstappen
11. Palmer
12. Magnussen
13. Perez
14. Button
15. Nasr
16. Wehrlein

With Haas taking points on debut for the first time since Toyota and Mika Salo (there’s a blast from the past) Roman Grosjean is overjoyed, and rightfully so. They benefited from the red flag, but the speed during the race showed that their qualifying performance was not representative of the car’s speed.

Here’s the order of the finishers:

You can’t blame them for getting excited and going all-caps. It’s a great start to the season for the Mercs.

Lap 56 – Unless Verstappen tries something outrageous on Sainz there’s not many changes in order to be had as we enter the last lap. This is Rosberg’s race, and Ricciardo will be pleased to finish fourth on home soil.

Lap 55 – Vettel runs wide on the last turn! That’s it for the battle for second place, and the Mercedes 1-2 is safe. Earlier in the lap Lewis had survived running over debris from the Sainz/Verstappen brawl.

Lap 54 – It’s Rosberg’s race to lose now, he’s got such a commanding lead that he can putt around safely now and make sure he gets to the finishing line. It’s likely to be the Mercedes win we all expected, but perhaps not the man in front. A 1-2 would not have been unexpected, but Hamilton’s trouble with Vettel has been greater than he’d have wanted. The German is now half a second behind in third.

Lap 53 – Lewis has stabilised his battle with Vettel, but the big battle of Sainz vs Verstappen has come to its natural conclusion with the two colliding. Both are still in the race, via a Verstappen spin, but this is a battle to watch for the rest of the season.

Lap 52 – Vettel is all over Hamilton now, cutting the gap to half a second. They’re both still 10 seconds behind the leader. Five laps remaining.

Lap 51 – Two of the rookies are still going, Palmer in 11th and Wehrlein the last man on track in 16th. The rookie team Haas looks like they’re going to pocket points on debut, with Grosjean sixth.

Lap 50 – It’s 8.4 seconds from Rosberg to Hamilton at the front, and a further 2.5 to Vettel in third.

Lap 49 – Seven laps left and Rosberg looks home from here. The gap between second and third is down to 3.2 seconds so we might see some action in that battle yet.

Lap 48 – Max nearly loses it all pushing hard around the corner but manages to save himself from an excursion of the track. Hamilton and Vettel are gaining on Rosberg, but neither at enough speed to make a difference.

Lap 47 – With Max Verstappen making like every 18-year-old male and swearing in public he’s unable to get past Sainz for 9th. Frustration levels are on the rise, and we’re all waiting for the great moment where he has a huge look at his teammate.

Lap 46 – Ricciardo takes fourth from Massa, prompting celebrations in the crowd, but he’s too far behind Vettel to challenge for third unless something crazy happens. Rosberg continues his pace at the front, with Hamilton 10.5 seconds behind.

Lap 45 – Rosberg continues to hold his comfortable lead, down the field most the excitement is in Ricciardo vs Massa for 4th place using his new set of soft tires.

Lap 44 – 12 laps left and the lead is still 9.9 seconds. Grosjean now sits sixth for Haas, but with Hulkenberg and Bottas right on his hammer.

Lap 43 – Ricciardo is forced to pit for new tires, allowing Vettel into the top three. The lead is nine seconds, with another six from Rosberg to Vettel.

Lap 42 – Rosberg adds a second to the lead on Hamilton, while down the field Sainz finally gets past Palmer, and Verstappen joins him two turns later.

Lap 41 – Sainz and Verstappen are having a ding dong battle behind Palmer, with Carlos locking his Toro Rosso up under pressure from his teammate. Meanwhile Palmer is still keeping both at bay.

Hamilton gets Ricciardo into second on the straight!

Lap 40 – Vettel is flying, back to 17 seconds behind Rosberg and seven behind Hamilton. Marcus Ericsson is on the verge of retirement in his Sauber with mechanical issues.

Lap 39 – Rosberg has 19 seconds on Vettel in fourth, with questions about whether Daniel Ricciardo’s tires can get him to the end of the race in second.

Lap 38 – Hamilton contines to gain ground on the leaders while Jolyon Palmer holds Sainz and Verstappen off in 9th place.

Lap 37 – Our top 10:

Rosberg, Ricciardo, Hamilton, Vettel, Massa, Grosjean, Hulkenberg, Bottas, Palmer and Sainz. 17 drivers still left.

Lap 36 – Vettel rejoined the race in fourth, with Hamilton starting to put pressure on Ricciardo as the fastest man on the track. Rosberg leads.

Lap 35 – Vettel is in, and Rosberg takes the lead. Ferrari put the soft tires on but lose time with pit lane difficulties.

Lap 34 – Rosberg is slowly catching Vettel, cutting the lead to a second during the lap before ending it 1.4 behind. Tire strategy is going to prove crucial, with Mercedes looking to take Rosberg through to the end on this set.

Lap 33 – Verstappen pits but it’s a sloppy one, possibly due to a late call, and he loses out significantly. Hamilton now up to fourth.

Lap 32 – The margin is 2.3 seconds at the front, and the question is how long Vettel can stay out of the pits.

Lap 31 – As Vettel loses time to Rosberg, Hamilton has a look down the inside of Sainz and can’t get him but then takes advantage of Sainz’s trip down pit lane to get back in front. Sainz comes out behind Perez in 12th.

Lap 30 – There’s a good battle developing between 8th and 10th, with Grosjean, Hulkenberg and Bottas all within two seconds.

Lap 29 – Just over the halfway mark, assuming the race isn’t called for time before 57 laps, and Vettel remains in charge. Down the list Hamilton is still stuck behind Sainz and Verstappen.

Lap 28 – After a lap where Rosberg took a sliver of time off Vettel’s lead the German has made it up again. Down the field Grosjean is now up to eight after his lucky break with the free pit stop.

Lap 27 – The lead is out to three seconds, with another seven between Rosberg and Ricciardo.

Lap 26 – Marcus Ericsson has been handed a drive through penalty for having his team work on his car in the last 15 seconds before the restart. It won’t make much difference as he’s at the back of the field, but a free position will come in handy for Manor’s Wehrlein who is currently 16th.

The man in Red continues to leave, but he can’t quite shake Rosberg.

Lap 25 – In the battle for 4th to 6th Hamilton is still 0.8 behind Sainz who is roughly the same behind Verstappen. The surviving Ferrari ads another 0.2 to the lead.

Lap 24 – Rosberg continues to lose time on Vettel, and with Ferrari always the most popular team in the stands of Melbourne it will be a very well received victory if Sebastian can stay there.

Lap 23 – The retirement leaves Ricciardo third, and every chance of a popular hometown podium finish. Verstappen is fourth, now on the verge of his first top three appearance. What a race it’s been so far.

Lap 22 – Vettel continues to lead, but Raikkonen pulls into the pits with the forlorn cry of “something’s broken” and retires with a fire in his airbox. The ‘something’ was a giant flame burning centimetres above his bonce. That puts Bottas into the top 10, and Palmer’s goes a step closer to a point on debut.

Lap 21- Vettel extends the gap to 1.5 seconds, with the last runner Kevin Magnussen in the Renault. The big winner of the red flag was Grosjean in the other Haas who hadn’t yet pitted and now sits 9th.

Lap 20 – Rosberg takes Raikkonen for second on the restart, but Hamilton is down to seventh and now has to get past Carlos Sainz before he even gets another look at Verstappen. It’s a 1.3 second lead, with another 1.2 from Rosberg to Kimi.

Lap 19 – The cars are leaving pit-lane, but they’re doing it without Manor’s Rio Haryanto who has retired from his maiden race. That leaves us with 18 runners. The safety car is coming in this lap and we will resume hostilities with Sebastian Vettel in front.

Hamilton’s got an alarm going off in his car but his team aren’t able to provide advice due to the new rules.

Before we return to the race here’s a video view at what prompted the red flag.

While we clear up let’s look at what’s happened so far:

• Daniil Kvyat’s car failed him in Melbourne for the second consecutive year, despite some suggestion that he might start from pit lane to use it as a glorified practice session he has now officially retired.
• The two Ferrari cars jumped Hamilton and Rosberg on the first corner and have remained in front but for pit stops since.
• Hometown hero Ricciardo looks like the best he can settle for is a points finish.
• Fernando Alonso walks away unscathed after a massive crash which practically left his turned into a cube
• Confirmation, as if we needed it, that the crash will be investigated by the stewards after the race.

Almost ready to go again, with a hasty clean-up job leaving the track clear.

@alo_oficial R U OK?

The safety car restart from pit lane has been confirmed for 16:55 local time (10 minutes).

The current classification is: Vettel, Rosberg, Raikkonen, Ricciardo, Verstappen, Sainz, Hamilton, Massa, Grosjean, Bottas in the points.

Hulkenberg, Palmer, Perez, Ericsson, Button, Nasr, Wehrlein and Haryanto and Magnussen finish the lineup of cars still on the track.

A better look at the damage to Alonso’s car. That is the posture of a man who has just seen his life flash before his eyes.

Hamilton has changed a damaged wing while in the pits, and we’ll let you know when we know more about the proposed restart time.

Here’s the first pictures of the incident, with Gutierrez running straight to Alonso to make sure he was ok.

All the cars are returning to pit lane while the carnage is cleared. Fernando is waving to the crowd, he has come out unscathed from a scary shunt.

Lap 18 – The safety car is out with debris littered across the track, and the remaining cars are into the pits. The replay shows Alonso attempt a passing move on the Haas car which ripped his front left wheel off, propelled him into the wall and then through the air into the sand trap.

The race has been red flagged while the damage is recovered. The fact that he’s walking away from that is a big tick for car safety.

Lap 16 – Vettel is back past Hamilton, giving him a buffer to Rosberg who now needs to get past his teammate to resume the chase. Kimi has come in at last, handing the lead back to Vettel, and Lewis is on the way in as well.

Lap 15 – I think by now we can probably be sure that Kvyat’s not going to be seen again, and if he leaves it too long watch out because the speed limits around these streets under normal circumstances are ruthlessly enforced.

Rosberg has the new fastest lap of the race, and it’s game on at the pointy end of the race.

Carlos Sainz has just nicked past Jenson Button for 9th.

Lap 14 – Vettel is under attack from Rosberg, whose lightning quick pit stop has put him right back in the fight. The gap between them is about 0.8 seconds, as they run third and fourth waiting for Raikkonen and Hamilton to pit.

Lap 13 – Rosberg’s quick pit-stop, with one of the team having to jump out of the way or be mowed down, allows him to get out just in front of Hulkenberg. His teammate Hamilton is on the radio with the discussion of a longer pit stop strategy, though he is starting to make ground on Verstappen.

Vettel is in!

Lap 12 – With not much happening at the front of the field we’re treated to a great battle for 11th between Palmer and Bottas. The Williams man eventually won the scrap but he had to work hard for it after some great defence from Palmer.

Rosberg is in!

Lap 11 – The scheduled pit stops are starting, with Felipe Nasr in but all the cards are in Ferrari’s favour at the moment.

Lap 10 – The lead is 2.5 seconds, while Lewis Hamilton has been on the radio to discuss his pit stop strategy given that he can’t get past Verstappen for love nor money.

Lap 9 – Verstappen has got Lewis covered so far, no wonder much of the pre-race talk was what top team he’d be at when his current contract expires.

Wehrlein in the Manor has done well to get up to 14th, but neither of the Haas cars are showing much form at the moment.

Lap 8 – Seb is holding court so far, with Sainz the first of the top 10 runners to go through the pits.

Lap 7 – Vettel retains his lead, while his teammate has nudged further in front of Rosberg. Hamilton is frustrated behind Verstappen but had a couple of looks and couldn’t risk trying to pass.

Red Bull are still working on Kvyat’s car, he’ll start a long way back if he does but it’s almost worth it just to take the curse off his Melbourne experience.

Lap 6 – Lewis is now gaining on Max Verstappen for 4th, but he’s still well behind the top three.

Lap 5 – Vettel’s lead is under two seconds as Rosberg draws to within half a second of Raikkonen in the battle for second.

Lap 4 – Lewis passes Massa to move up to 5th, but his dramas in traffic on the first turn have cost him. Vettel continues to lead as we’re treated to a repeat of practically the entire race until now rather than live pictures.

Lap 3 – Hamilton is fighting with Massa and Sainz for sixth. He’s all over Massa and it won’t be long until he gets past.

Lap 2 – Vettel continues to lead like days of old, pulling away from Kimi while Gutierrez’s Haas is having mechanical issues. Timing screens suggest Kvyat is out.

Meanwhile this is quite right:

Lap 1 – Vettel and Raikkonen lead with a dynamic start. Kevin Magnussen, another DNS in Melbourne last year, has a puncture and will be pitting shortly. Hamilton down to 6th!

Here he is, looking lonely at the back. We’re down to 57 laps now and if he does start it will be well after the rest of the field. We’re almost ready to go again.

Disaster for Kvyat in Melbourne a second year in a row! He’s stopped in the middle of the grid with the other cars ready to start. We’ve got another formation lap while his issues are sorted out.

He’ll have to start from pit-lane if they can restart the car, otherwise he will leave Melbourne full of fear and loathing.

Cars are moving in the warm-up. The top eight are all on super soft tyres, with a mixture of super soft and soft. McLaren has split their strategy with Alonso on super and Button on soft.

Confirmation that there has been a relaxation of the rules about what teams can and cannot say to to their drivers during the race. This dropped an hour before the race, and now teams can give strategy information to the cars.

It’s a sensible change, and you wonder if yesterday’s qualifying debacle prompted the authorities to make a late, late change to try and avoid more bad publicity.

We’ve also had the traditional shot of an Australian man wearing a hat with corks hanging off it, so we must be right to start racing soon.

Arnold Schwarzenegger is back in pit lane, and when asked if he drove fast cars he replied “No, I drive tanks”. There’s an idea to add razzle dazzle to Saturday qualifying.

Sadly after he was such a hit last year he won’t be doing podium presentations today. Let’s hope he has a sudden change of mind and commandeers the microphone.

What chance the home victory Aussie fans have been pining for ever since Mark Webber piloted a Minardi into the points in 2002? Daniel Ricciardo will start from 8th, and he’ll certainly battle for points if not the podium but unless there’s some significant storylines at the front of the field it doesn’t look likely.

Meanwhile Jensen Button has just said that last year “racing” was his team’s weakness, which goes without saying based on results. They’re bang in the midfield this time, so it will be an interesting trial to see how far they’ve come in the off-season.

The teams are undergoing test starts from the pit lane to test the single-clutch starting method which has been enforced this year. They’ll have done hundreds, if not thousands, of similar trials during testing but it’s a last chance to make sure everything’s ok before it really becomes important. The F1 website has details of what the change means.

The cars are now on the track, and this is the point where cars started dropping out last year so don’t blink or you might miss an afternoon ending prematurely. We’re about 25 minutes away from the race.

This is the 21st running of the race in Melbourne, and though its future remains one of those ‘break in case of emergency’ news stories the community passions which moved thousands of people to protest during the mid 90’s have all but disappeared.
My abiding memory of the first race, 14-years-old and high on F1 passion after years of being forced to watch on television, was changing spots shortly before the start of the race from the spot where Martin Brundle tipped his Jordan on the first lap. They say never meet your heroes, but as a Jordan fan it would have been quite a way to get close to that beautiful bright yellow car. I’ll be going for Renault today because of the happy memories evoked by their livery. Some other ‘fun’ Albert Park facts to fill the time: 1) South Melbourne Football Club, briefly famous for taking on Manchester United in the first FIFA World Club Championship in 2000, play at a ground inside the circuit. They’re forced to play a series of away games while the park is occupied.
2) For the rest of the year while there’s no racing the pit buildings are used as a five-a-side football centre. I once saw the worst refereeing decision in history there – apply within for details.

The traditional driver line-up shot is live, and it’s all… err… looks of steely determination.

Who will end the afternoon shaking his fist in anger at a colleague?

Welcome to a Melbourne for the first main event of what will be the longest Formula One season in history.

With 20 more races to follow before the year wraps in Abu Dhabi on 27 November there is much water to pass under the bridge but the title contenders will be keen to land important psychological blows on the streets of Albert Park.

After rain across the first three days of the event Melbourne has turned on a magnificent day, and with plenty of sun left in the afternoon the weather shouldn’t be a factor.

After qualifying on the front row of the grid the Mercedes cars remain red hot favourites, with bookies suggesting the only realistic alternative is Sebastian Vettel in the Ferrari. Lewis Hamilton goes in as red hot favourite for the race, and the title, with qualifying times suggesting Nico Rosberg could be the only one to challenge him in an incident free race.

If they get through the first lap unscathed procession mode may be activated, but for now everything’s on the table so whether it’s very early in the morning, late at night or somewhere in the middle wherever you are stick around for our first 58 laps of live GP coverage this season.

What we know so far

Simon Hahn has put together this handy guide to ‘Everything you need to know about Formula 1 in 2016’ which covers the off-season rule changes. Don’t spend too much time on the bit about the new qualifying format though…

… because after receiving worse reviews than an Eddie Murphy film the hastily introduced new format looks like it will be lucky to make it to the second race in Bahrain.

Despite his team’s dominance Toto Wolff of Mercedes described it as “total rubbish” and the rest of the industry soon piled in as well, including several drivers who offered their own spin on the timeless “I’m not the kind of guy to say I told you so, but I told you so”.

Drivers were eliminated in the middle of hot laps, or while sitting in the garage after realising they didn’t have enough time to beat the drop. Fans in the stands had no idea what was going on, and those of us watching on television weren’t much better off. It was often only when you saw the man in the relegation zone giving up hope of surviving and vacating his car while the clock was ticking that you knew he was finished.
The end result still saw the best cars at the front of the grid, but as a spectator event it failed miserably to jazz up Saturday qualifying. Even if the system is not completely binned at the very least drivers must be allowed to finish laps they’d already started when the countdown expired. Here’s a free suggestion, give everyone adequate time to drive a few laps then order the grid from fastest to slowest time.

New faces

The excitement of the first race of the season is usually boosted by a number of drivers nervously beginning their F1 career. This year we’ve got three rookies and one brand new team.

In qualifying the best of the bunch was Renault’s Jolyon Palmer who was 14th fastest. The son of Jonathan becomes probably the most prominent holder of the name in motorsports since Captain Haddock irritant and president of the Vagabond Car Club Jolyon Wagg.

Next was Indonesia’s Rio Haryanto, who narrowly beat his Manor teammate Pascal Wehrlein on the track but received a three place grid penalty for colliding with Roman Grosjean of Haas in pit-lane. Given that his teammate was the only man he’d finished in front of the penalty boiled down a swap of positions on the last row. Both Manor cars struggled, but simply getting on the grid is a significant step up from last year where they were in Melbourne but unable to start due to financial difficulties.

The Haas cars represent the first US backed tilt at F1 in three decades, and they had a difficult introduction to the circuit. Even when they weren’t being rammed by competitors the cars were eliminated immediately after the two Manor entrants. The team has suggested that they could have run as high as 14th if not for ‘tactical errors’ so if they’re right look for Grosjean and Esteban Gutierrez to perform better under race conditions.

Here’s the final grid, taking into account Haryanto’s collision penalty and Valtteri Bottas losing five places after an unscheduled gearbox change:
1. Hamilton (Mercedes)
2. Rosberg (Mercedes)
3. Vettel (Ferrari)
4. Raikkonen (Ferrari)
5. Verstappen (Toro Rosso)
6. Massa (Williams)
7. Sainz (Toro Rosso)
8. Ricciardo (Red Bull)
9. Perez (Force India)
10. Hulkenberg (Force India)
11. Alonso (McLaren)
12. Button (McLaren)
13. Palmer (Renault)
14. Magnussen (Renault)
15. Ericsson (Sauber)
16. Bottas (Williams)
17. Nasr (Sauber)
18. Kvyat (Red Bull)
19. Grosjean (Haas)
20. Gutierrez (Haas)
21. Wehrlein (Manor)
22. Haryanto (Manor)

Adam will be with you shortly but in the meantime, check out our video guide to the Albert Park circuit.