Mid-pack battle captures Kiwi fans

There will be two clear battle packs this Formula 1 season and today will provide us with some answers around where each team sits at the start of a fascinating 2018 season.

Defending manufacturers’ champions Mercedes, Ferrari and Red Bull look to be the class of the field once again but how they match up against each other remains to be seen. By the end of the day we will have some answers — at least in terms of one-lap pace with qualifying giving us a fair gauge.

The area most Kiwi fans will concentrate on however will be the mid-pack battle where New Zealand’s Brendon Hartley is hoping to be in the thick of the action.

His Toro Rosso team has made the off-season switch to Honda power and the initial signs are encouraging with a successful fortnight of winter testing in Barcelona where the new car seemed reliable and on the pace.

Teams tend not to reveal all their cards in testing with tyre condition, fuel loads and engine modes not openly revealed. But Hartley at least seems optimistic about the machinery he has to work with this year and is targeting his first championship point on the Albert Park circuit.

That won’t be an easy task — not only will he still be getting used to his new car but he also has to learn the part road, part park track having never driven it before.

“It is quite a unique track — it is a park and isn’t raced on all year so it will evolve a lot during the course of the weekend as the rubber goes down and the grip raises,” Hartley said.

“It is a track I really enjoy driving on the simulator but it is all going to be new to me.”

Toro Rosso will be in a battle with the factory Renault team, McLaren, Force India, Williams, Haas and Sauber — hoping to be more towards the front of that list than the back.