Aussie rules when it comes to F1's scheduling problem

Twenty years ago, the last iteration of the Australian Grand Prix in Adelaide concluded the 1995 Formula One season. Pole-sitter Damon Hill won the race at a canter, while title winner Michael Schumacher retired after a collision with Jean Alesi.

- KIERAN JACKSON

However, the most remarkable fact from the event was that the whole weekend welcomed 520,000 fans. It is an all-time F1 attendance record which, despite the sport’s peak popularity ratings currently, still stands to this day as the only race to attract half a million spectators.

But Albert Park in Melbourne, hosts since 1996, is getting there. This year’s event, spread over four days, attracted 465,498 people – an increase of more than 140,000 since the street circuit last hosted the season-opener in 2019 – and more significantly, 350,000 more than last year’s season-opener in Bahrain.

From media sessions and the rough-and-tough Australian Supercars on Thursday to a thrillingly chaotic grand prix in the rain on Sunday, Albert Park exuded a fervent atmosphere throughout the entire weekend. You only needed to hear the rapturous noise from the grandstands when hometown hero Oscar Piastri delicately reversed his car out of the grass as the drama peaked in the 58-lap grand prix.

It was a fever-pitch opening to a fever-pitch season.

“It’s certainly been more significant this year, having the seasonopener,” Travis Auld, the CEO of the Australian GP Corporation and former Aussie Rules executive, tells The Independent.

“You’ve got Lewis in red, you’ve got Oscar, you’ve got the 75th anniversary of F1. You’ve got new drivers on track. There’s so much interest and the sport is doing so well. We’re definitely the envy of most sports around the world.”