Changes ring in new era

By Peter Auf der Heyde Mar 19, 2007, 14:14 GMT

Melbourne - When seven-time world champion Michael Schumacher announced that he would quit Grand Prix racing at the end of the year, it was clear that a new era of Formula One racing was about to begin.

Nobody quite new what that new era would entail, but Sunday's Australian Grand Prix that Finland's Kimi Raikkonen won in a Ferrari from the two McLaren-Mercedes' of Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton, suggest that the changes are huge.

Raikkonen and Alonso are, of course, no newcomers but both changed teams at the end of last season and managed immediately to be successful with their new teams.

And Hamilton is the new kid on the block - a hugely successful new kid and at 22 showed a maturity during the race that belied his age.

When compared during the post-race press conference to a young boy, he reacted rather sharply though and said that he is 22 years and no longer a boy. He brushed the journalist's comment that 'he has shoes that are older than that' aside with the contempt that it deserved.

Regardless of how old he feels though, Sunday's podium was the youngest-ever in the history of Grand Prix racing and with Raikkonen 27, Alonso, 25, and Hamilton, 22, the average age was just slightly above 24.6.

This would suggest that not only has a new era in terms of new drivers for teams started, a new era is being heralded in by young drivers such as Hamilton.

Not surprisingly newspapers reflected on these changes and The Herald Sun led with a headline: 'Welcome to the Future,' while Le Parisien said: 'Kimi Raikkonen's victory in Melbourne has catapulted Formula One into a new era. Michael Schumacher and all his records are forgotten, as are all Alonso's victories in blue-yellow.'

However, that Schumacher still looms large over the Grand Prix circus, which he dominated for so many years was also apparent, as not only did he immediately phone Raikkonen after his victory, several of the post-race questions dealt with the S-Factor.

A journalist asked how important Schumacher had been for Ferrari in the run-up to the start of the season and how he had worked with Raikkonen. The Finn seemed irritated by the question and brushed it aside, saying that Schumacher had been there just twice. 'Both times I left virtually as he came.'

It was apparent that Raikkonen is very much a driver who just wants to get on with the job and not be burdened by questions about drivers who no longer race. He was though pleased that winning in Albert Park ensured that he would at least evade another question.

'It was a great start to my season with Ferrari and having won a race already, people will at least not keep on asking me when I will win my first race with Ferrari.'

But while the results at Albert Park heralded in a new era, there are suggestions that the race marked the end of the Renault era, which saw Flavio Briatore's team pick up two drivers' championships and two constructors' championships in the last two years.

After congratulating a BMW official for Nick Heidfeld's fourth place finish, the official responded by saying: 'I had expected the Renaults to be much faster.'

Briatore's curt reply: 'So did I.'