THE BIG PICTURE: Thankfully, it only took the third race of the season to eliminate the question of whether Red Bull would sweep the season; heck, whether Max Verstappen would sweep the season by himself.

EVENT: We thought last year's weekend attendace was astounding. This year topped that at 452,055. This event looks like a lot of fun to attend. It's just that 14-hour plane flight...

TRACK: Some of those walls seem to be in odd places and the lack of certain types of safety barriers also seems odd.

QUALIFYING: Verstappen holds off the Ferraris, Sainz makes a medical comeback, Perez penalized three spots, Tsunoda looked strong, Albon keeps his borrowed car on the track, Ricciardo is an embarrassment, and Alpine continues to do slow Alpine things.

RACE: The cheers heard round the world on lap three, but in truth, the rest of the race wasn't that much more exciting than a typical Red Bull romp. But it was still fun to see something different.

START: Was that the cleanest start in F1 in a long, long time? Not even a wheel dropped off, never mind zero contact.

SAINZ: In the first quarter of this year, Carlos lost his drive for 2025, lost his appendix, had to listen to all the praise for his Jeddah replacement, and yet he is the only Ferrari driver to win in the last two seasons.

FERRARI: Through all the hoopla of their 1-2, it should be noted that it appears they have indeed solved their tire management problems. So much so, especially on this rough track, they arguably could have contended with Red Bull on the track.

NORRIS: Fourteen podiums and still no win, breaking Nick Heidfeld's record.

PIASTRI: Quite sporting to obey team orders without a complaint when he was giving up a podium finish in his home grand prix ... 10 minutes from where he grew up.

PEREZ: Though Sergio has done better this year, this is the type of race he's supposed to win to minimize constructor points loss for Red Bull. And to not even be on the podium...

VERSTAPPEN: When Max said it was weird how his car stepped out on him, that was the first clue something was wrong. And wow was it wrong.

RED BULL: Rumors they want to eliminate the Australian GP from the schedule are unfounded. We think...

STROLL: Who noticed that Lance outqualified Alonso and then got to finish ahead of him thanks to a penalty?

ALONSO: It was quite evident right away that Fernando brake tested Russell. The penalty should have been harsher.

TSUNODA: For all the criticism Yuki gets on many fronts, and we're just as guilty, he very well may be the second best driver Red Bull has on the F1 grid.

RICCIARDO: It's over. The experiment has failed. Put Liam Lawson in the car. Pronto.

HAAS: They too have seemingly solved their tire management issue. Two cars in the points attests to that.

HULKENBERG: And Nico got there this time without the blocking help from his teammate.

MAGNUSSEN: While Kevin joined the points fun.

ALBON: We're not saying Sargeant would have done better, but the idea of Williams keeping Alex in the car to grab some points turned out to be a failure.

SARGEANT: Watched his car being raced by his teammate when he did nothing wrong. Brutal.

WILLIAMS: Modern day F1, and there are still teams not fully stocked to successfully complete a race weekend? What must Michael Andretti be thinking...

SAUBER: Fix. The. Wheel. Nut. Threading. Problem.

MERCEDES: They seem lost. Completely lost. Hamilton doesn't even seem mad anymore. Just resigned.

FIA: Nikola Tsolov purposely crashes someone into a wall during practice (practice!) and only gets a three-grid penalty. WTF?! Then, the FIA takes away an F2 victory for avoidable contact when it was clearly an unavoidable racing incident in the craziness of the first few hundred yards after the start. The FIA has totally lost the plot.

F2: Isack Hadjar won the sprint race, or so he thought, until he was given that absurd penalty. So, the Frenchman gave a big proverbial middle finger, and promptly took advantage of the VSC, winning the feature race from the eighth starting spot for his first F2 victory.

F3: Frantic and exciting marked the weekend. Norwegian Martinius Stenshorne survived a late race restart to take the sprint race, while Swede Dino Beganovic took his first win in the feature race.

WORD OF THE WEEKEND: Appendix.

STAT OF THE WEEKEND: 43 -- The number of consecutive finishes for Max Verstappen before his brakes went up in flames. Coincidentally, his last DNF was also Australia, two years ago.

HISTORICAL STAT OF THE WEEKEND: It's not like drivers have never been removed from their car to make way for a teammate. The most shocking one was the 1986 Austrian GP. Riccardo Patrese's Brabham broke a gearbox heading to the grid. Since he started fourth, six positions ahead of his teammate Derek Warwick, team owner Bernie Ecclestone decided to put Patrese in Warwick's car. Warwick was already strapped in and would have none of it. Ecclestone had to get some beefy mechanics to forcibly remove Warwick from the car. After all that, Patrese's engine failed after two laps.

TWEET OF THE WEEKEND: From @RobLMyers:

I'll say it again: Hamilton's decision to move to Ferrari is looking like an absolute masterstroke.

QUOTE OF THE WEEKEND: Lando Norris shares the winning advice he got from Carlos Sainz, "Carlos told me I should get my appendix out; get it taken out and you win the next race..."

QUOTE OF THE WEEKEND RUNNERUP: Lewis Hamilton, "I don't think my car can get any worse than this." And this is considering the 2022 car.

SCHEDULE: Japan is moved to the spring, cherry blossoms, and more importantly away from the monsoon season. Since it's his home race, will Tsunoda once and for all bury Ricciardo into oblivion?

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