Morning Warm Up

Things didn't go well today for Villeneuve in the warming up. He had to park his car beside the track after it broke down. Also, the Sauber of Frentzen and the Minardi of Lamy ended up beside the track after their cars both failed. Hill was fastest in the morning.

Other notes... Panis spun his Ligier and his team-mate (Diniz) didn't want to be second to Olivier and took a shortcut through the grass immediately followed by Mika Hakkinen. Jos Verstappen ended the session 8th.

First eight:
1. Hill
2. Alesi
3. Berger
4. Schumacher
5. Frentzen
6. Irvine
7. Salo.
8. Verstappen

Summary

Hill followed team-mate Villeneuve from the start with a maximum of one second between them for most of the race. However, Villeneuve suffered an oil pressure problem in the last stage of the race and had to slow down and let Hill past.

Notes

The race was stopped after just a few kilometres of competition when Martin Brundle hit the rear of Johnny Herbert's Sauber and went airborne resulting in the Jordan being broken in half. Brundle walked away unhurt and resumed the race in the T-car (but spun a few laps later into the race). Minardi driver Pedro Lamy had to start from the pits because of gearbox problems. Coulthard had to re-start the race from the pits and pulled into the pit boxes when he thought his car was no longer driveable.

Jean Alesi tried to overtake Eddie Irvine when he lost control and slid sideways into Irvine's right rear-wheel, ripping Alesi's sidepod apart. As a result, Alesi had to retire. Dutch driver Jos Verstappen also had to retire after blowing his engine. Schumacher had major braking problems which resulted in him going into the pits for a check-up and then going back onto the circuit and into the gravel... ending his race on lap 32.

Quotes

Hill was very pleased about the first win of '96: "I feel fantastic, everyone in the team deserves this. I had a great race with Jacques. I've come back to Australia and won. It's been a long time since I led the world championship, and I feel on top of the world... Jacques showed he is a racer. We were both very strong and the team is looking very strong."

Villeneuve commented about the loss: "For sure it's disappointing, but second for my first race is great. The race was fun -- it was a great battle with Damon... He put a lot of pressure on me and was never slowing down"

Irvine could not be happier: "I'm very glad with third place. We had so many problems with reliability and to come here on second row really surprised me, and for us to finish the race."

Results

1. Hill - Williams-Renault 1:32:50.491
2. Villeneuve - Williams-Renault +38,020
3. Irvine - Ferrari +1:02.571
4. Berger - Benetton +1:17.037
5. Hakkinen - McLaren +1:35.071
6. Salo - Tyrrell-Yamaha +1 lap
7. Panis - Ligier-Mugen +1 lap
8. Frentzen - Sauber-Ford +1 lap
9. Rosset - Arrows-Hart +2 laps
10. Diniz - Ligier-Mugen +2 laps
11. Katayam - Tyrrell-Yahmaha +3 laps