Despite its policy coming back to bite it a few times over the years, Martin Whitmarsh declares that his drivers will be free to race one another today.

"It's difficult to call off the fight between drivers," the Englishman told reporters. "We haven't done it traditionally. They both very strongly want to win this race, and they know it's a free race.

"Over the last few years there have been a few moments when I've been getting lots of advice on what they should be doing. But generally we've allowed them to race and that's what people expect of us and what our drivers expect of the team."

Which is just as well because according to everything we see and hear, today's race will be all about Lewis and Jenson with everybody else reduced to doing the best they can, fighting for the scraps that fall from the table.

While Michael Schumacher is delighted to have qualified in the top three, he is the first to admit that unless there is a major upset he has no realistic chance of taking victory.

Such is Red Bull's situation, the Austrian team had to make the bold decision to change strategy, sending Sebastian Vettel out on the prime (hard) tyre for his final Q3 run. It worked, but it will make his job that much harder in the opening stages.

Teammate Mark Webber insists that the RB8 will be stronger in the race, however, we all know that it was the intervention of the safety car in Melbourne that prevented McLaren starting the season with a 1-2.

A superb performance from both Lotus drivers, with Romain Grosjean proving his Melbourne qualifying performance was no fluke, and Kimi Raikkonen putting serious pressure on the big guns. Providing its drivers keep out of trouble, the Enstone team should see both drivers finish in the points today.

Nico Rosberg will be ruing his overdriving yesterday, having wrecked a real opportunity to qualify ahead of the Red Bulls. However, despite his performance, and that of his teammate, there remains serious concern as to how the German team uses its tyres.

Fernando Alonso faces another difficult afternoon, but no doubt the Spaniard will give it 100%, as he did in Australia. At a time when his team need it most, the two time champion has the ability to shrug off adversity and rise to the occasion.

The real dark horse today could be Sergio Perez, the driver who continues to spring surprises. No doubt he is considering another of his epic tyre marathons in his efforts to mix it with the big boys.