I Flew 17000 km to see Lewis Hamilton's Debut in Ferrari

In today's video, I've flown 17,000 kilometres to see Lewis Hamilton's debut in Ferrari. It took over 24 hours travelling from the UK to Australia, with a little stop off in Sydney beforehand. And whilst I was there, I checked out Oscar Piastri's burger from Grilled, which was insane by the way. You would have seen that on my Instagram. But we're not here for burgers. We're here for Formula One, and we're here at the Slipstream Hospitality at Albert Park. And I want to preface this before we get on with the rest of the video, absolutely no brands involved with this trip and this video. This was purely a trip as a Formula One fan, as a customer basically, because this scenario was basically a once in a lifetime sort of trip for myself and my girlfriend Abby, because it was a case of one, a season opener at the Australian Grand Prix. And obviously, we would end up having a wet season opener, two, Lewis Hamilton's debut in Ferrari. Only happens once, ever. And then three, very nicely going to this season, pretty much a good bet that Lando and McLaren would get off from the get-go and be able to fight for the race win. Those three things happening at the same time would never happen ever again. So when we got to the circuit and confirmed that this would be our insane view from the top floor of Slipstream Hospitality, we were over the moon. This is insane. This is overlooking the fast chicane in Sector 3. Right now, you can see on screen the Formula Two cars going round, but when F1 goes round, oh boy, it's going to be something special. But the vibes were high on the Friday. The sun was high. It certainly was a case of trying not to roast up there on the top floor, and more sun would be on the way on Saturday. And just brilliant, every single time I get a coffee from anywhere, they cannot spell my name. Apparently, my name's Aaron. And very quickly, as we overlooked the circuit, one objective was clear. We were going to try and ride that Ferris wheel in the distance across in one of the fan zones. But then as the F3 and F2 practice sessions came through, we then had a classic car, I think, promoter activity where I think people actually could bring classic cars they owned. So I think they actually owned these things, and they were just out here for like a merry ride around Albert Park. Why not? But soon, soon come, it was time for that sweet, sweet first Formula 1 session. FP1, usually, you know, from the UK, it would be what, like 1am, 2am viewing, staying up late. But today, it was in the morning for us, in the sunshine. We're just starting our day, and it was time for the first time with our own two eyes to see Lewis Hamilton out there driving a Ferrari. Yeah, crazy, crazy, crazy place to watch Formula 1 cars go by. Later in the video, I'll be going to the ground level of this hospitality, and you can kind of see even better the kind of speed at ground level. But just even from this high, it's crazy seeing them go through that quick left and right hander. This is just practice, obviously. They're going to get even quicker. And I was seeing, you know, tweets also that it was very apparent from the TV cameras as well. The cars look extra quick around here this year at Albert Park. And like I said, on Friday and Saturday, with the sun fully out, it was a real lovely place to be. Was going to change a little bit on Sunday, but for now, it was a nice summer vibe in March, which was crazy. We had a week's holiday before this in Sydney, and it was, yeah, just crazy to kind of skip seasons and skip ahead to summer in March, knowing it was like 1 degrees back in the UK. But anyway, FP1 was done with, and it was now time to explore Albert Park, the fan zones. Again, beach vibes going on, palm trees alongside the lakeside, and the famous pontoon walk across the lake to the main fan zone. We were going to get to do it ourselves for the first time. And just so many, you know, surreal moments, you know, seeing so many videos and photos from this circuit from years gone by as the season opened or when it used to be, you know, like round was around three, around four, whatever it was. And so now actually getting to do these things and see it for our own two eyes was just epic. And you know, it's always exciting going to a brand new circuit. You know, I've had the privilege of going to a fair few Grand Prix circuits. And whenever it's a new one, it's, you know, just, you know, a whole new world of just exploring the entire thing, seeing the differences of track to track. One of the biggest differences here at Albert Park was just this unreal middle part of the scenery with the sun out, the lake, the city skyline, the backdrop. It was incredible. That is incredible. I love Silverstone. Don't get me wrong. It's great. The British Grand Prix rocks, but you don't get a vibe like this is ******* summer in March. And it looks like this at a Grand Prix circuit. And I mentioned skipping ahead to summer in March, because of course here, Australia, they're coming off their summer months, basically. And the fan zone, the main fan zone here really did feel like some sort of summer music festival you'd find in the UK. Maybe that one day there's some sunshine, a plethora of, you know, food carts. You got bars again, that insane skyline in the background, just kind of, you know, constantly reminding you where you are. But then you have some really cool like, you know, just sculpt sculptures, I guess you could say in the middle of the entire fan zone, you had all these flags going about a big main stage where, you know, they're constantly having like drivers coming up throughout the day. You have the kind of Melbourne Junction where, you know, they're pointing in the right direction of these various fan zones because they actually nicely broke them up into like three or four different sections, a mahoosive official team merchandise store. And thankfully, we'd already got Abby a Ferrari cap because she's a massive Lewis Hamilton fan. We couldn't find a Hamilton hat because, you know, shock horror, they're all sold out, but still cool nonetheless to see just a merchandise store in such scale and then see just a very different fan zone to what I've seen plenty of times at, let's say, Silverstone, seeing Tag Heuer for the first time sponsoring Formula 1 and seeing the kind of little activations and logos popping up. The new Tag Heuer signage, by the way, at the end of the pit lane, I actually really, really dig. I know Rolex had some massive aura, but the Tag Heuer, you know, sponsoring at the end of the pit lane is still pretty great. What? Solar system, isn't it? Yeah, it is. Come to F1. This is automatically the best Grand Prix for us as drum and bass fans having drum and bass blasting around the circuit. We're not too well supplied. Exactly. Yeah. So with the main bit of the fan zone exploration done, we headed back to the Slipstream Hospitality, another great view of the lake on the right hand side. And this time we were sat on the ground floor. So we were level with the track. And this time you can kind of get a greater sense of the speed. Now, it doesn't pick up too great on camera because the camera can't look past the grate. You get a little inkling of what I'm on about here in these clips, just honestly, just with the ground level effect, basically just seeing the car level with the camera and we're not looking over it. Right. So it's day two now here at the Australian Grand Prix. In that day one, you would have seen our first day in the heat. We've got an even hotter day coming up today, but went through like, you know, some of the fan zone areas, got a little bit of a vibe of it. You would have seen all those before. Today we're going to hit the family area, which is on the other side of Albert Park. I think the Lego activation is there. Lego is now going to be coming to every single Grand Prix or a lot of them and doing activations like that. So we'll see that. I think there's like a mini ferris wheel and stuff. It's just like a more like kid friendly area, but it seemed kind of cool from the other side of where we're sat. And then obviously it is qualifying today. So we're going to really see whether McLaren is going to be slapping everyone up or maybe Ferrari have something there and how awful Red Bull might be, et cetera, et cetera. A lot of different, you know, question marks off of practice. But yes, one person here is going to hope for a Lewis Hamilton pole position. I was going to say Charles, but big, big LH fan. I don't really care at this point. I'm just I'm here for vibes. I'm here. I just want a really good fight in Q3 and then hopefully in the race. But yeah, this is the hotel we're in. It's pretty decent. Obviously you guys know on the channel I've done, you know, races where I've been with Hilton. They've been some insane rooms. This is a decent room. But the big thing is it is a sick room for the location, because if I get up to go to the window here and flip the camera around and oh my God, the light of God is coming through, eventually it will focus. That is the track right there. This is the room and then that is the track right there. That is a hospitality area right there. That is the straight off the far chicane that goes down into the right hander over there in the last sector. And we are sat at Slipstream, which is literally just over that tree line. So an insane location for a hotel makes things so, so easy when it comes to going and coming from the circuit. Like I think, well, queues obviously are going to take some time, but the actual walking time is like less than 10 minutes. It's great. Not as crazy as the Hilton that I did two years ago in 2023, where that was actually on the track. But this is as good as it gets, really, really easy. So I'm going to take you on a little time lapse of how easy it is to get from this room to our hospitality suite and it's pretty bonkers. But yeah, coming up, quali, bit more exploring the track and probably trying to escape the sun as much as we can, or not trying to get too, too fried. So here we are out the door of our hotel room, go to the lift, wait for the lift, get in said lift, go down and go through the lobby, which had some very nice Formula One racing kind of decorations. Walk down the road on the outside of the hotel, cross the road, then just a tiny walk through security, get through there, then walk across to the overpass bridge. We're going to be going over that and then it's going to be a very familiar kind of sight to what you saw in the first few clips from Friday, where we walk alongside the lake to our hospitality. And it really is as easy as that. I think the raw video time was about 12 minutes mental. So as promised after FB3 before qualifying, we're going to explore the other fan zone that was across the track from our view. The family zone is a little bit different. It's got the Lego activation for the first time this year. Lego is going to be at, I think, maybe every track or a lot of different tracks activating here with the new Lego Speed Champions range. The other, you know, city sets, the Duplo sets. You can actually build your own little Lego car, I think, and take it away. And you can then also buy the Lego sets there on track. I think that's really cool, really clever from Lego and F1. And it's just awesome to see such a big brand like Lego putting a lot of effort in with Formula One. Because if you've been with me and with Formula One for a while, that effort very much wasn't the case in years gone by. There was a paddle court in this family zone as well. That was pretty crazy. And then it was time for the infamous Ferris wheel. Aaron doesn't believe me, but this is going to be worth standing in the hot sun on a 32 degree day. It's going to be worth it. Look how funny. It's giving. It's giving joy. You know that Edinburgh Fair ride thing, where it was like, meant to be like some like, it was like AI generated posters. Yeah. And it just didn't turn out to be the thing. You mean the Willy Wonka thing? The Willy Wonka thing. Yeah. It's like that. It's going to be like that. All right, well, here we go. No, we have to get everyone else on. Yeah, I know. Yeah. So this is like a little test preview of what we've got going on. Should we make it rock? Huh? No, let's not make it rock. Let's be not. What are you doing? Let's be calm and sentimental. We've got an unbalanced car. Okay. I'm about twice the weight as you. You need to calm down. So it's giving. It's giving. See, that's a cool view. That's a cool view. It's ice cream time. Secured. You don't understand how refreshing the ice cream was. It was incredibly hot, even though it was slightly cloudy. The heat on Saturday there was unbearable, but we still soldiered on looking through this other fan zone. We'd sort of, I don't know, we'd sort of, I don't know, we'd sort of, I don't know, you could actually get into. So obviously for people who have never experienced something like that, that's really, really cool. There was that rocket ship space car that I don't understand exactly what it was doing there, but it looked pretty cool nonetheless. But all activities that I felt like, you know, would be cool in slightly cooler conditions. I think the thing most people want to do was just stay cool in the shade. You did have the usual F1 simulators, F1 pit stops up. They have at most of the F1 fan zones, but like I said, for us especially, the number one priority at that point was trying to stay cool and also getting a cool little view of the main fan zone from a different angle, from the top of the quad lock rooftop area that we got a little bit of access to, thanks to a friend. Say hello to the vlog, Ethan. Hello vlog. Welcome to Australia. We're here in quad lock. Let's go. Perfect. We then made it back in time to our hospitality for qualifying, unfortunately, because we did leave the area in between FB3 and quali. Obviously, being quali day, things got very packed, so we couldn't really find a good spot up top to get a viewing, you know, that was unobstructed with the gates, so we kind of found one a little bit lower down, also wanting to view a TV, but you can see it was very crowded, a similar sort of thing that I've talked about before in previous vlogs in these sort of areas. Still, we'll make it work, nonetheless, and enjoy that very tense qualifying. Clara look, very rapid. Here we go, the last minute of Q2 to make the top ten shoot out. How are we feeling? Tense, nervous. They're all whizzing by. This corner's been insane, seeing them full pail in quali is ridiculous. They're so quick through the section right next to us. All right, this is it, no hiding now. Oh, yellow flags. Oh no, who's that for? What's happened? Who's that for? Oh no, Lewis. Lewis is backwards. Lewis is facing the wrong way. Oh my God. I think he'll be fine. I think he'll make it through still. He'll make it through though, I think. I hope. Can Jack Dewan do anything? No. And the crowd goes mild for Jack Dewan in P13. Oh, not enough improvement for Hadjar. He's in the drop zone. Snowed his own really well, P7. Come on, Sainz. Sainz, up to seventh. Albon, it's all good. That's an OK time. 6 tenths covering the top 10 is kind of crazy. Oh, Verstappen with two purples. Here we go. The sandbags are off. Verstappen wringing the neck out of the red ball. He's going to go P1 in it. Oh, oh wow. 0.097 between the top three. Landa goes top. Piastri second. Yeah, Lewis is through. All good. We're calm. It's OK. Can't be doing that though. Looked like he was playing F124 there, to be fair, with that kind of spinning. Two and a half minutes to go. I'm so nervous. The butterflies in my tummy. Oh, Max has got it right now. Everyone's bottled it so far. So dear everyone else, please stop bottling it and you could actually get pole. Right now, it's Verstappen. The commentator's really hyping it up. The commentator's really hyping it up and it's getting everyone going here, to be honest. The Aussie crowd are cheering on Oscar. Green, green. Lando, purple. So one of the McLarens could do it. One of the McLarens could do it, maybe. Max, yellow. That's a good sign for everyone else. Oh! Lando going to come through and ruin it. Is Lando going to ruin it? Oh! The home crowd, they're hating it. They're hating it. The home crowd are hating it. Lando just got pole by a tiny amount. Lewis, what can he do? Span it in Q2. Just behind McLare. The Ferrari just needs to get quicker. The Ferrari needs upgrades. Sign's not bad. P8. Gasly's done amazing. Dow qualified both Williams. P7. Really good from Gasly. Oh! Al Bono. What the ****? Al Bono. P5. Right. That was quali. I guess in the vlog, this will cut to the next day, race day. It's wet. Yes, very wet. It's race day. It's been pissing it down. But that's going to make for a very tasty race. There was already someone off there. You can see his car actually been taken away still. Yep. So clearly, basing off that, it may be a bit chaotic later on. But that's good for us. No complaints here. It was a bit wet getting in. But it's all right. We found the spot. And we've got hot drinks of all good. This is our spot for the whole race. Now time to watch some F3, F2 action. And I'm hoping it stays wet enough that it's going to be a wet start to the race. Because wet to dry will be utter chaos. I think this is what they call biblical rain. When it's wet, you must use the wet tires. It's like rain. It is a bit crazy. And somehow F2 is still out. They're not diving, are they? Yeah. They're out there. What? Oh, yeah. And it's red. Is it? And it's red. Yeah. No, they aren't. Very British of you. The guy on the tunnel just came to say, well, the weather is starting to clear. Brother, what are you on about? What are you on about? I think it might be Mark or Jeff in the F1 game. Call it shots. Call it the way the weather is. Nothing has cleared. What's that mean? This is the current situation. What mean? Don't make that journey. Oh, don't make unnecessary journeys. Don't swim in the sea. We've made a little tent for ourselves. A little makeshift tent. Basically, the way this works, guys, I hope you can hear me, is, as you well know in previous vlogs that I've done of Hospitalities, for some reason, they don't design them very well for the amount of tickets they sell. And seating places or good viewing points are very limited. You know, I've talked about this before in Vegas, where I basically didn't even watch the race live. I basically watched it on TV, just on location. So, to combat that today, we got in early. We've determined to just sit here on the outside bit of this hospitality. But it does mean right now we are bronting the wind and the rain. It's going to be worth it. Okay, that's a good sign. They're doing the whole shebang at the start. And the rain. Oh my God, they're dancing in the rain. It's giving step up. Bloody hell. It's worth it. This is it. This is the difference. What does that mean? This is the difference between you and I. If you were down there, in the warm, doing this. I was here, up here, waiting for a real proper view. Not some shit view through a drain. Not a sip on my champagne. Eventually, though, it did seem like we were going to get things underway. The driver's parade occurred. And just praying that there wasn't another torrential downpour this time. And soon, we had cars on track. So at this point, I think we were all thinking, yeah, we're going to actually get a race. Because that was the worry earlier. That maybe the race would get delayed because of the rain. Now we're getting hyped. Oh no. That's rough. So yeah, a bit of a messy formation lap. Not ideal. So the cars had to reform again. Very, very peak for Hadjar. You know, really felt for him in that moment. Especially seeing the scenes of Anthony Hamilton consoling him. What a G, by the way. Lewis Hamilton's dad is for doing that sort of thing in a very tough spot. But yeah, the cars reformed. And we're ready to get going again for the actual full first lap. And from now on, we're going to be cutting in with live commentary bits. And reacting to bits throughout the race. Obviously, showing bits of the race. Oh. Sight. Getting close. Come on, come on, come on. Come on, Lewis. Lewis. Close again. Oh, come on, brother. Make the overtake. Come on. Please. He's getting close, but it's no cigar. McLaren are absolutely thumping everyone. Bring back the MP4 for livery, I say. Oscar's 1.2 now, though. If Oscar, 1.1. Oh, it's about to get tasty. If Oscar can get in DRS, it's game on. That's the gap now. It's close. Oh. He's right on him. Oscar's right on him. The crowd are going to love it. The crowd are going to go wild. Oh, it's close. He's going to get so bored of Albon's rear wing. Of Albon's rear wing. And Lewis Hamilton's rear wing. What does it say? Atalazian on the William's rear wing. Hamilton's going to get real bored of Atalazian. Oh. Liam Lawson just got lapped by Oscar. Oscar was under one second. He's now 2.9. So he gave pressure, made a mistake where Russell crashed last year at the end of the race. So that's why he's no longer in DRS. So the fight for P1's cooled off a bit. I must say McLaren are absolutely slapping everyone. Oh. Alonso. More people. Alonso. The rookie. He stacked it. Oh, there we go. Safety car. Bit stop, bit stop. Let's see. Safety car could change things. I don't know. Is anyone going to risk it on dry? I guess we'll see. He lost it. To the grass. Oh, Lando. McLaren. Oh, what the? Cheering because Oscar just managed to reverse it. Oscar's gone into this. Lando pit off the lead. So they're snapping leads. Hamilton second. But some people are pit. Some people think it's too wet. I mean, clearly it was too wet for Oscar. It was clearly too wet for Oscar. The rain's definitely coming down. The umbrellas are out. Some of the ponchos are out. Is Lewis carried on? Lewis Hamilton leads in the Ferrari. Just end it now. Red flag the whole race now. Yellow flag. Oh! Lawson. I'm telling you. That second Red Bull seat is the Man United of Formula One. Oh, he's so slow. Oh, Lewis was so slow. He got done by Lando. Oh, no. Leclerc spun. Double stop for Ferrari. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Antonelli up to P5 quietly. Pit printers way before them, too. You got up the stop in Russell. See that? See that right there? That is the first bit of sun we've seen all day. We have sat in the rain for six long, wet, miserable hours. We are going home in the sunshine. It's just standard, isn't it? It's just so standard. Absolute peak. It's actually looking... Beautiful, actually. Beautiful. Beautiful sun. Where have you been all day? Why? Why does it have to come out now? It was for the plot. The plot had to thicken, all right? We have to go through all the dark, miserable emotions of the wet weather sat here the whole time. Holding umbrellas. Yeah, all that. Leclerc. Oh, and Hamilton. Yes! Both Ferraris through. Lovely. I think Kimi Antonelli could be on for fourth here. Oscar take two on the Alpine. Surely easy pass. Oh! Go on! Antonelli! Oh, the saffron's turning up for the last two laps. He's putting the pressure. He's putting the pressure on him. Two laps, is it? 56, 57. Oh, OK. The pressure's on here with Lando. I think Lando's got it, but you just never know. Max relentlessly pushing. Half a second now. Oh! And Kimi gets T-ball! Go on, Antonelli! Oh! George Finesse. Gigi's Antonelli! Oh! Piastri on the last lap! Oh, my word! What a move! I'm like, where do I go with that? I'm happy and I'm sad. Yay! What a move! Lando wins it. Gigi's Antonelli. Come on! T-4 for Kimi Antonelli. Antonelli, driver of the day. Driver of the day, Antonelli. Antonelli, driver of the day. What a lovely race for Kimi. And so concludes the 2025 Australian Grand Prix and this vlog. If you guys have enjoyed it, then be sure to hit the like button. Let me know what you thought in the comments below. If you're new around here, then do get subscribed for weekly Formula 1 content. I'll see you guys next time. Goodbye.