The 24-race, 2025 Formula One season begins with the Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne this weekend. McLaren and Red Bull’s Max Verstappen start their respective defences of the constructors’ and drivers’ championships, with two free-practice sessions today ahead of qualifying tomorrow. Today: FP1 (9:30pm ET), FP2 (1am ET).

Oscar Piastri headed the timesheets during the third and final practice session at the 2025 Formula 1 Australian Grand Prix.

Reuters, the news and media division of Thomson Reuters, is the world’s largest multimedia news provider, reaching billions of people worldwide every day. Reuters provides business, financial, national and international news to professionals via desktop terminals, the world's media organizations, industry events and directly to consumers.

Excitement is building for this season with at least four of the ten teams in serious contention for the Championship. The post F1 Australian Grand Prix 2025 preview: season-opener will reveal team strengths appeared first on The Manual.

The action starts today (Friday, March 14, 2025) with FP1 at 12:30pm local time (AEDT), followed by FP2 at 4pm AEDT. Then, on Saturday, FP3 gets underway at 12:30pm AEDT, leading up to the crucial qualifying session at 4pm AEDT.

Because Formula 1 teams try to hide their capabilities during preseason testing, the first race often shows who is fast and who is not.

After three impressive races during the 2024 in a reserve rule for both Ferrari and Haas, Oliver Bearman earned a full-time seat at Haas for the 2025 Formula 1 season. But that rookie campaign for Bearman has gotten off to a very difficult start.

Haas driver Oliver Bearman triggered a second red flag in two days at the Australian Grand Prix as he spun off the Albert Park circuit just three minutes into the final free-practice session on Saturday.

Ollie Bearman escaped unharmed after a heavy crash in practice at the season-opening Australian Grand Prix. The 19-year-old, making his full-time F1 debut with Haas after three races as a reserve last year,

Bearman was the first man out of the pits in FP3 on Saturday, but dipped a tyre all the way onto the grass on his first flying lap and spun out into the gravel, where his car beca