The Albert Park F1® curse and the Aussies who could break it in 2025

As Melbourne has gone from new destination to one of the sport’s most enduring Grands Prix, Australian fans have continued to throw their support behind their local heroes.

For one Aussie driver, their debut race created arguably Melbourne’s biggest F1® moment.

Another sparked celebrations – for a while, anyway – unlike any Melbourne had witnessed before, or seen since. A current star made history in his very own home city, and now in 2025, a son of motorsport royalty is ready to make his own name. 

By 2002, Melbourne was well-established as the first chapter in any new F1® season, but in those six years since Albert Park arrived on the Formula 1® calendar, the Aussie fans hadn’t been able to throw their support behind one of their own.

Enter, Mark Webber.

At 25, the former sports car racer was, even by 2002 standards, quite late to make his F1 debut and what he did on that memorable March day in 2002 was simply magical. 

The most dramatic opening to any Australian Grand Prix before or since parted the seas.

And Webber took full advantage.

Australia’s first F1® driver since 1994 scored points on debut with a fifth place finish – even more impressive is that he was behind the wheel of a car that hadn’t scored a single point in three years. 

Cue pandemonium – and an impromptu visit to the podium. 

Webber’s breakthrough saw his contract swiftly rewritten and started a run of Australians on the F1 grid that hasn’t stopped to this day. 

It was fitting when, in 2013 as Webber’s Formula 1® career wound down, his replacement at Red Bull Racing would be another Aussie. 

While Daniel Ricciardo didn’t make his Formula 1® debut in Melbourne, his career timeline would have his home Grand Prix at its core. 

As the third driver for Toro Rosso, the 21-year-old drove a Formula 1® car for the first time at a race weekend in practice in Melbourne in 2011, three months before his race debut for HRT.

A year later, Ricciardo’s first Formula 1® points came at home when he finished ninth in his first Australian Grand Prix start. 

And then came 2014. 

In his first race as Webber’s successor at Red Bull, the smiling Aussie slithered to a brilliant second in qualifying, converting that into a second place for his first Formula 1® podium a day later.

The Melbourne crowd – and Ricciardo himself – went wild.

It was a fairytale that seemed too good to be true… and in the end, it was. 

Hours after the euphoria, Ricciardo was disqualified for his car breaching the sport’s fuel-flow rules. In nine more Albert Park outings for three teams, Ricciardo never hit those heights at home again. 

Australian Formula 1® drivers are rare, and a driver from Melbourne competing in their home Grand Prix at Albert Park was a void waiting to be filled. 

Step forward, Oscar Piastri. 

A championship winner in Formula 3™ and F2™ on his way to Formula 1®, Piastri was one of the hottest prospects to come onto the grid when he debuted in 2023. 

So hot, that McLaren moved mountains when it moved on from Daniel Ricciardo to find a new teammate for Lando Norris.  

Piastri’s Formula 1®, debut came in Bahrain in 2023, but race three at Albert Park was one he had circled on his calendar. 

In a race that got crazier the longer it went, but by the end of it, Piastri was eighth – and had his first world championship points in what really was his own backyard.

Piastri returns home this March to open his third season, with two Formula 1® wins in his pocket, and with the dream of becoming Formula 1® World Champion a very realistic goal, and with an Australian driver yet to officially stand on their home podium after 27 races in Melbourne, the local lad is a strong chance to be the first. 

Piastri’s moving to McLaren opened up an opportunity for the next Aussie young gun to take his next step on a motorsport journey that seemed preordained when Jack Doohan took over the reserve driver role vacated by Piastri at Alpine for 2023. 

Doohan watched, waited, tested and ticked all the right boxes and this March, becomes just the fourth Australian Formula 1® driver to be able to call Albert Park home.

It’s a rookie Formula 1® race that will be filled with nerves and excitement, one played out in front of a fervent fan base that can’t wait to see what happens next, because as Webber, Ricciardo and Piastri have proved before home, anything really is possible for a driver racing at their home Grand Prix.