Formula 1’s Australian Grand Prix weekend kicked off with all 22 drivers - and some senior team figures - speaking to the media on Thursday.

Here’s everything we learned ahead of the first day of on-track action on Friday.

Aston Martin’s in even worse shape than we thought

We already knew Aston Martin-Honda was going to be starting 2026 heavily compromised, with newcomer Cadillac its closest (and perhaps only) competition in Melbourne.

But we now know the vibrations triggered by the Honda power unit are causing problems for both the car and the drivers.

Adrian Newey revealed there are fears of “permanent nerve damage” after 25 consecutive laps for Fernando Alonso and 15 laps for Lance Stroll because of those vibrations throughout the chassis.

Alonso explained how it makes your hands and feet feel numb, while Stroll compared the feeling to “electrocution”.

It also means, in the words of Stroll, the “whole car [is] just falling apart with that level of vibration”.

That’s hardly ideal for Aston Martin’s chances of finishing the Australian GP with either car, let alone getting any kind of meaningful result.

Perhaps the biggest test of its weekend is the first fix for the vibrations. It’s shown promising results on Honda’s dyno, but that needs to be validated in reality.

Honda is still trying to figure out the root cause of its vibration issue - until then, the AMR26 is running in a compromised state.

The obvious implication of Newey’s analysis is that Honda is responsible for the majority of the four-second deficit in testing.

He claims Aston Martin has the fifth-best chassis (around 0.75-1s off the pace), with an aggressive development plan that can help it close on the top four teams. You can’t help but be reminded of similar McLaren claims during Honda’s last great F1 struggle.

But if Newey’s claim is right, a potent AMR26 chassis will still mean very little if Honda can’t figure out a solution to its stint-limiting problems. - Josh Suttill

Melbourne will be 'incredibly tough' compared to Bahrain

Pre-season testing exposed drivers to the reality of the demanding energy regime of these cars, but many of them point to Albert Park as a circuit that presents what Carlos Sainz called "an incredibly tough test" for the 2026 rules.

That's thanks to the limited amount of braking around the lap, meaning that a greater proportion of energy harvesting is necessary on the straights through techniques such as super clipping.

"Bahrain wasn't actually too much of a challenge," said Sainz. "It was quite a big change, but still within reasonable limits. Then the simulator work I did prior to Melbourne looked quite extreme. It looks like it's going to be a very different, very interesting weekend and especially very different from what we saw in Bahrain in testing. [An] incredibly tough first test for this new set of regulations, given the circuit layout."

Team-mate Alex Albon echoed those sentiments, saying "for it to be the first race of the year, I think it's going to be a bit of a shock for everyone".

The extent of the energy challenge is reflected in the fact this is one of four tracks the FIA currently plans to run to the reduced per-lap harvesting limit of 8.0 megajoules.

"Here is one of hardest tracks that we go to," said Racing Bulls driver Liam Lawson.

"For a first weekend, it's going to be very tough. From Turns 2-3 onwards you're very much on throttle with very little lifting or braking. If we want to drive flat out, we don't have enough energy to last the full lap. It's something we have to try and manage as best we can."

Haas's Ollie Bearman described it as "maybe the worst-case scenario of these regs", which also explains why everybody should be cautious about drawing definitive conclusions from what happens this weekend as Melbourne is at the extreme end of the spectrum when it comes to energy-starved tracks along with Jeddah, the Red Bull Ring and Monza. - Edd Straw

Rivals are suspicious of Red Bull's true pace

The huge early impression that Red Bull had made in Bahrain testing abated a bit after six days - but not everyone is convinced day six was a truer picture than day one.

"I think Red Bull looked suspiciously slow in the second test, to be honest," George Russell insisted, the Mercedes driver having already been among the loudest in talking up the RB22.

"We had them down as arguably the quickest in the first test. And based on our numbers, they went seven tenths slower compared to themselves in the second test. Whereas ourselves and Ferrari went a couple of tenths quicker with a few new upgrades to the car.

"I'm struggling to wrap my head around how they've lost seven tenths in a week. So I expect them to be very strong, to be honest, and that's why we're all really intrigued to see how it pans out."

Russell wasn't alone in the belief Red Bull has something up its sleeve. "I’m not really sure whether we’ve seen the full, unleashed Red Bull yet," Lewis Hamilton mused.

This, of course, wasn't exactly corroborated by the Red Bull drivers themselves.

Max Verstappen made it clear that he doesn't care to get involved in any such conversation, while Isack Hadjar said of his RB22 expectations: "I'm just basing this on what I saw in testing and at the moment it seems like...we have a good race car, which is what matters.

"On one-lap pace, I don't think we are special. That might be a bit tricky but...honestly, what happens in the first race, who cares? It's how you finish the year anyway." - Valentin Khorounzhiy

The race could be chaotic

The word 'chaos' and its variants have already been mentioned several times in Melbourne. Mercedes driver Kimi Antonelli points to the question marks about the start, as well as the offset between cars at full power and those harvesting in flat-out sections creating the potential for passing, as reasons to expect plenty of action.

"The overtake mode is incredibly powerful, and that can give a bit of chaos [on] lap one, especially if everyone jumps on the overtake mode," said Antonelii. "I think straight mode, even in the little kink, shouldn't be a problem because it's both axles, so it actually balances quite a bit, you just have less load.

"The race start is going to be another big thing. With the blue panel [giving an extra five-second hold once the grid is formed] it's a bit easier, but still getting the timing right, building the boost in the right moment, is going to be crucial because if you don't do so, then you can have a really bad start. Ferrari looks in a very strong place on that side, so it's going to be important to keep working because in Bahrain we did struggle a little bit.

“But then, we don't know, maybe in Australia in the first race on Sunday we're going to have a mega start. But I think this race can be a bit of chaos...a little bit of chaos."

When Antonelli talks about overtake mode, he appears to be referencing the more generic boost mode at least some of the time. While overtake mode (which allows deployment of full power on laps that follow the last-corner detection zone if you are within one second of the car ahead at a point where other cars are having to taper off the deployment) is only available in specific circumstances, boost is a push-button maximum power option available whenever you have juice in the battery.

"To follow is not easy, but because this track is so demanding on energy the overtake mode can give you six tenths in one straight over the car in front - it can even give you up to eight tenths," said Antonelli.

"And also, there are places where if you deploy full battery, obviously it's not maybe efficient if you look at the laptime optimal, but it can be a place where the other car is not deploying and saving battery and if you press the overtake boost you gain basically 400bhp compared to an optimal lap and you can gain massive amount of laptime and you can make a move in a corner where the other one doesn't expect.

"When I talk about this, it's more start of the race, safety car restart, and even last lap if obviously you're in a scenario where the cars are close to each other. Then of course, during the course of the race when it's stabilised, of course it's going to be a bit more difficult. Here, you have incredible amount of super-clips, so you do slow down on those straights and the overtake is extremely powerful because you don't super-clip, so the speed either stabilises or keeps increasing. The first stage of the race can give a lot of spectacular moves and eventually some chaos."

Some drivers have more question marks about straight mode than Antonelli, however, with Pierre Gasly suggesting that the opening lap, with straight mode engaged and the front and rear wing backed off, could get exciting.

"Let's see how it is in a racing situation with a full tank and following other cars very closely," said Gasly.

“Obviously we lose a huge amount of load front and rear. So far we've only experimented this SM mode in dead straight line. This is clearly not straight, so that's going to make it...exciting." - ES

...and so could qualifying

Haas driver Ollie Bearman suggested in Albert Park that with chaos comes opportunity. And there may be no greater chance to gain from chaos than qualifying in Melbourne.

Of all the flashpoint elements that drivers and teams are unsure of, with the new 2026 cars, it is the shootout for grid positions that looks set to be the point of the weekend where the lines between disaster and success are thin.

The challenges of keeping the battery charged and the tyres in the right window, while avoiding traffic chaos at Albert Park, look like being a recipe for disaster in terms of shock knock-outs.

As Haas boss Ayao Komatsu said: “To charge the battery on the out lap, at certain corners you have to go slow and on certain straights you have to go flat out. But if you are letting somebody through on the straight, when you should be flat, you are screwed aren't you?”

Bearman’s team-mate Esteban Ocon felt that things would play out critically over the final sector.

“I think it will be quite straightforward until Turn 11,” he said. “If Turn 11 there is a problem, then it's where things go wrong.

“Until Turn 11, fine. But if you have some cars in front of you or you have to drop out or whatever, then the problem starts there. And hopefully for everyone!” - Jon Noble

Bottas’s comeback has got easier

As if losing his Sauber seat and dropping off the F1 grid at the end of 2024 wasn’t bad enough, Valtteri Bottas has known since December that year that any return would bring with it the necessity to serve a five-place grid penalty for punting his 2026 team-mate Sergio Perez in the 2024 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.

Last year, there was a rule change that ruled out a repeat for another driver, but it appeared that it wasn’t going to be applied retroactively to save Bottas.

However, a fresh wave of sporting regulation changes does make this change retrospective.

It feels particularly important now that Cadillac might not actually be the slowest team, so a five-place grid drop might actually make a tangible difference to Bottas’s starting place, rather than just being 22nd instead of 21st. - JS

More details of F1 movie sequel

The existence of a sequel to the Lewis Hamilton-produced F1 movie - a commercial success and a shock Academy Award for Best Picture nominee - had already been confirmed by fellow producer Jerry Bruckheimer, but with very little in the way of extra detail.

Even though the project is clearly in very early stages, some of that detail has now been filled in by Hamilton himself - including that of his own continued involvement.

Notably, Hamilton revealed that the "first meeting" about the next movie came "maybe mid-to-late second part of the end of the year [2025]" and namechecked both Joseph Kosinski and Ehren Kruger as being involved.

Kosinski was the original's director, and Kruger received sole screenplay credit. The two had proven a productive combination across F1 and its ultra-acclaimed 'spiritual predecessor' Top Gun: Maverick, but the screenplay of the first F1 movie was not exactly widely regarded as one of its stronger suits.

"With Ehren, we’ve had plenty of meetings on it. It’s really exciting. I’m super excited," said Hamilton - who ruled out any idea of having a prominent on-screen part in the project as he made it clear he doesn't "really have a lot of desire to be on camera".

"Now I’ve been through it [the first movie's production] and it was already very intense the first time going. Now I’m used to it, so I know what to expect, I know what we could do better.

"It’s been amazing to see how big an impact it’s had, how many people have loved the movie. I’m still getting texts from people who are only just watching the movie and how it’s opened their eyes up to what this sport is about, and it’s sent them down a rabbit hole trying to understand it more.

"The second one, for me… sequels often aren’t always great. We’ve got a great team, got a great cast, great writer, so I’m not concerned about that, but we’re going to take our time and make sure we get it just the way it needs to be." - VK