Yellow and red, especially the latter, were the dominant colours at the first day of the Australian Grand Prix.

These are the colours associated with the Medium and Soft compounds which covered over 5000 kilometres across the two free practice sessions, with none of the 20 drivers opting to try the white-banded Hard.

Red is also the colour of the quickest car on track, Charles Leclerc's Ferrari, the Monegasque setting the best time of the day (1'17"277) in the second session. He outpaced Max Verstappen (Red Bull, 1'17"658) and his own team-mate Carlos Sainz (1'17"707), the Spaniard back in action having had to miss the last two days of the Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, after undergoing an appendectomy.

Quickest in the first session was Lando Norris (McLaren), who stopped the clocks in 1'18"564, ahead of Verstappen (1'18"582) and George Russell (Mercedes, 1'18"597).

Red was also the colour of the flag that had to be waved to stop the first session after Alexander Albon (Williams) crashed. The Thai driver was unable to take part in the second hour of free practice because of the damage to his car.

It was a typically warm and sunny late summer day in Melbourne, with the wind intensifying between the two sessions. The decision by teams and drivers not to use the Hard in either session is a clear indication that the C3 will be the preferred compound for the race. Furthermore, based on the data seen so far today, the gap between a one and a two-stop strategy seems to be decreasing, increasingly opening up the possibility of witnessing a mix of strategies that could therefore make for a very interesting, even spectacular Sunday afternoon.

Simone Berra, Chief Engineer: "The day saw teams and drivers all go in the same direction in terms of what will be the preferred compound for the race, namely the Hard. It's a completely predictable choice given that we decided to bring a trio of compounds one step softer than last season. We also expected the graining that was quite noticeable today on the Medium and Soft, as well as the significant track evolution from one session to the next, as demonstrated by Leclerc's FP2 time being 1"3 quicker than the time set by Norris in FP1. Another particularity of this circuit, due to its characteristics, is that graining does not significantly improve as the track rubbers-in, something that we have seen in the past and more recently, since the track was resurfaced in 2022."

Check out our Friday gallery from Melbourne here.