Leaving work at 1:00 am gave just enough time to get home and get comfortable before the Australian Grand Prix Free Practice Two. I turned on the telly and was caught off guard. The sound of the engines reverberating through the silent house was amazing. I had followed free practice one online and was not ready for the impact the engines would have. Sure, we had all endured the winter break and looked forward to testing, but with testing, most of the teams had brought what they thought would be their '2011 car' would only be changed from test to test and updated. As fans, you didn't get the 'true sound' of 2011. Free practice two gave me just that. 
What I heard screaming through the telly was the sound of the 2011 Formula One season. The cars circling Albert Park Circuit were there to say. They were the teams 'finished product', well all but Hispania Racing Team's... The only changes past this point would be more on the aerodynamic side, visible to the viewer, the sound though. That will not change. It was the 'true sound' of the new season.
Free Practice in Albert Park gave the drivers' a taste of how the Movable Wing or Drag Reeducation System, would feel like in a 'real world' test. (Most may know what the DRS is and does but if not, read about it here) Along with the new technology though, came a new set of guidelines from the FIA on it's use and regulation of it. And as we all had guessed, those rules evolved practice to practice. Many new regulations on the new technology before the premier race even began. It starts off with the DRS only being able to be used in certain sections of the circuit and long as the car in front is within 1 second of over taking. The car head also cannot use the wing to defend against the overtake.
The first change or ban of the use of the wing would be when the car had 'wet weather' tyres on. Finally, a smart decision by the FIA. Albert Park, being a street circuit, gets quite slick when it gets damp. Everyone knows that street circuits come with the regular traffic use and some 'regular' cars leak different fluids. Sure, the surface of the track may not appear to have an residue on it, but add some water, even just a sprinkle of it, and the surface can get slick. So the use of the rear wing is banned when the rain starts and the cars change to wet-weather tyres.
The showers subsided at Albert Park and the track started to dry. Some of the teams swapped back to slicks and started their drivers' using the DRS again to practice. It must have been brought to the attention of the FIA, and a new regulation was brought about. It is no longer if your car has on wet-weather tyres, it is if any car has on wet-weather tyres, the use of the DRS is banned. In all fairness, it is a good regulation but with the history of Formula One, there will be a team, somewhere down the line, that will exploit it.
During the practice sessions, there were a few mishaps, but the one that stood out, above Team Lotus' reserve driver going off and shunting the car at turn three or even the sprinkling of different Pireli compound tyres all over the track would be Hispania Racing Team... Or the lack there of... After seeing inside there pit garage, it appeared there were two car in there, just in pieces. It also seemed that HRT was intent on showing millions of viewers while live on air, how a Formula One car is constructed. With about 5 minutes left of free practice two, HRT send Luizzi out in the finished HRT for once round of the circuit before calling him back into the pits without crossing the start line once. It seemed almost parade line in a way....
Free practice one, Red Bull proved to themselves, their fans, and their competition that they are determined and a dominating force to be reckoned with by pulling in the two top times in the session.
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