No more rain expected for at least 30 minutes, and we’re on lap 6. Hopefully we can get rolling soon.

Some dry lines are starting to form – but equally, it’s still very slippery on the painted lines. Ocon, Lawson, and Bearman have thrown on new sets of intermediates.

Amid all the madness, we missed a few positional changes; Leclerc got ahead of Tsunoda and Albon to sit fifth, and Hulkenberg has passed Antonelli and Bortoleto on his way up to P12.

Keeping the safety car out won’t be such a bad thing; gives the drivers a chance to displace some water and help the track dry out.

“Massive torque surge”, Sainz reports. The safety car brings the field through the pitlane.

Safety car – and Sainz has also hit the wall, at Turn 14!

That’s Doohan! His Alpine is missing a rear wing, and it’s sitting in the middle of the road. 

Verstappen starts well, but Norris holds on to the lead. The Dutchman passes Piastri for second.

Right, everyone seems to be lining up relatively unscathed…are we ready to go?

Formation Lap 2 begins. Keep it on the road, folks.

Right, a couple of minutes to go – let’s hope for no more incidents for the time being! We’ve not woken up at silly times for safety cars…

That’s very sweet – Hadjar’s made his way back to the pitlane, and is being comforted by Anthony Hamilton. 

The difficult bit about actually getting going, as Hadjar has proved, will be the white lines. Fiver says Martin Brundle says something about “eyes on stalks” as the drivers try to account for all four tyres.

The new formation lap will begin in 10 minutes. That’s 15:15 local time, that’s 4:15 GMT. 

Hadjar’s crash has delayed proceedings – hopefully Lando Norris has been reading the rules on this over the off-season; everyone has to switch off, and the mechanics return to the circuit.

Hadjar’s in the wall! The Frenchman has had a spin at Turn 2 and has backed his Racing Bulls car into the wall – and he’s broken his rear wing. So much for that previous post.

We’ll be getting a standing start after all – lots of drivers on intermediates, so clearly everyone’s satisfied that things have dried up sufficiently!

Just as a sidenote: Lance Stroll’s little sidestep in the intro sequence will remain funny throughout the year.

Five minutes until we get rolling here in Melbourne – likely that it’s not going to be dry enough for a standing start…initially, at least.

This is going to be an old school splashathon – Turn 5 looks pretty damp out there, there’s a fair whack of wind – but it’s not actually raining at the moment. 

In other news, Liam Lawson and Ollie Bearman are both set to start from the pitlane – Bearman didn’t set a time in qualifying, while Lawson has changed rear wing specification to something more suitable for wet weather.

Good morning, and welcome to our live blog for the 2025 season opener in Australia! If you’re just waking up, then there’s something you should know: it’s quite wet in Australia.