History of the Australian Grand Prix

Australia has been running a Grand Prix for almost a century. It’s one of the best-loved season openers on the calendar, the race every driver, team and fan wants to get right before the year properly begins, and one of the very few events on the F1 calendar that’s genuinely changed cities and character more than once and come out stronger each time. And in all that time, across two eras and two very different host cities, no Australian driver has ever won their home race once it counted for a world championship. That tension, a race this country has loved and hosted for generations, and a trophy no local driver can quite reach, is what makes the story worth telling properly. This is the full account: Phillip Island in 1928, Adelaide through the eighties and nineties, Melbourne today, every champion, and every record still standing.

Australian Grand Prix at a Glance

• First Australian Grand Prix: 1928, Phillip Island, won by Arthur Waite
• First World Championship Australian Grand Prix: 1985, Adelaide, won by Keke Rosberg
• Melbourne host since: 1996
• Most championship-era wins: Michael Schumacher (4)
• Most wins overall: Lex Davison (4, all pre-championship), level with Schumacher
• Most successful constructor at Albert Park: Ferrari (10 wins)
• Race lap record: 1:19.813, Charles Leclerc (2024)
• Qualifying lap record: 1:15.096, Lando Norris (2025)
• Attendance record: 483,934 (2026)
• Contracted at Albert Park until: 2035

Who Won the First Australian Grand Prix?

The Australian Grand Prix’s origins sit almost a century back, at Phillip Island, where Arthur Waite took victory in the 100 Miles Road Race on 31 March 1928. It wasn’t called the Australian Grand Prix at the time; that title was applied retrospectively as the race grew into a fixture of the local calendar over the following decades, which is part of why the “first” Australian Grand Prix depends on which era you’re talking about. In the championship sense, the one that actually counts toward a Formula 1 title, the story starts more than half a century later, in 1985, when Keke Rosberg won on the streets of Adelaide as the race joined the World Championship for the first time.

That gap between 1928 and 1985 is really the story of two different races wearing the same name. The pre-championship era, which ran for 57 years, was Australian motor racing’s own event, run to local rules on local circuits, mostly contested by local drivers. The championship era that followed turned it into Australia’s chapter in a much bigger, global story, and it’s the version most people mean when they talk about the Australian Grand Prix today.

The Nomadic Era: 1928 to 1984

For more than five decades, the Australian Grand Prix didn’t have a permanent home. It travelled the country, run on airfields, park circuits and closed country roads, from Phillip Island’s opening years through to venues in nearly every state, a genuinely itinerant existence that’s easy to forget once you’re used to seeing the race fixed at Albert Park every March. There’s something almost quaint about it now, a national motor race that simply packed up and moved to wherever the next willing town or circuit owner could be found. Albert Park itself has a pre-Formula 1 history worth knowing. The AGP was run there in 1953, won by Doug Whiteford, and again in 1956, won by the legendary Stirling Moss during Melbourne’s Olympic year, on a layout that ran anti-clockwise, the reverse of the direction cars take today.

The Tasman-era races of the 1960s regularly brought world champions to Australian summers, drawn out by a lucrative southern-hemisphere series that ran while the European season was in its off-months. Drivers like Jim Clark and Jackie Stewart raced on Australian soil in this period, alongside a strong home contingent, and Australian drivers dominated their own race in a way no Australian has been able to since. Lex Davison won the AGP four times, Whiteford three. It’s worth sitting with that for a moment, because it sharpens everything that comes later. Australians used to win their home Grand Prix routinely, on home soil, against a genuinely international field. The last to do it outright was Alan Jones, the reigning world champion at the time, who won the non-championship Australian Grand Prix at Calder in 1980, a result that now reads as the final chapter of an era Australians haven’t been able to reclaim since.

Every pre-championship winner, 1928 to 1984

Year	Venue	Winner
1928	Phillip Island, VIC	Arthur Waite
1929	Phillip Island, VIC	Arthur Terdich
1930	Phillip Island, VIC	Bill Thompson
1931	Phillip Island, VIC	Carl Junker
1932	Phillip Island, VIC	Bill Thompson
1933	Phillip Island, VIC	Bill Thompson
1934	Phillip Island, VIC	Bob Lea-Wright
1935	Phillip Island, VIC	Les Murphy
1936	Victor Harbor, SA	Les Murphy
1938	Bathurst, NSW	Peter Whitehead
1939	Lobethal, SA	Allan Tomlinson
1940 to 1946	Not held, Second World War	Not held
1947	Bathurst, NSW	Bill Murray
1948	Point Cook, VIC	Frank Pratt
1949	Leyburn, QLD	John Crouch
1950	Nuriootpa, SA	Doug Whiteford
1951	Narrogin, WA	Warwick Pratley
1952	Bathurst, NSW	Doug Whiteford
1953	Albert Park, VIC	Doug Whiteford
1954	Southport, QLD	Lex Davison
1955	Port Wakefield, SA	Jack Brabham
1956	Albert Park, VIC	Stirling Moss
1957	Caversham, WA	Lex Davison
1958	Bathurst, NSW	Lex Davison
1959	Longford, TAS	Stan Jones
1960	Lowood, QLD	Alec Mildren
1961	Mallala, SA	Lex Davison
1962	Caversham, WA	Bruce McLaren
1963	Warwick Farm, NSW	Jack Brabham
1964	Sandown, VIC	Jack Brabham
1965	Longford, TAS	Bruce McLaren
1966	Lakeside, QLD	Graham Hill
1967	Warwick Farm, NSW	Jackie Stewart
1968	Sandown, VIC	Jim Clark
1969	Lakeside, QLD	Chris Amon
1970	Warwick Farm, NSW	Frank Matich
1971	Warwick Farm, NSW	Frank Matich
1972	Sandown, VIC	Graham McRae
1973	Sandown, VIC	Graham McRae
1974	Oran Park, NSW	Max Stewart
1975	Surfers Paradise, QLD	Max Stewart
1976	Sandown, VIC	John Goss
1977	Oran Park, NSW	Warwick Brown
1978	Sandown, VIC	Graham McRae
1979	Wanneroo, WA	Johnnie Walker
1980	Calder Park, VIC	Alan Jones
1981	Calder Park, VIC	Roberto Moreno
1982	Calder Park, VIC	Alain Prost
1983	Calder Park, VIC	Roberto Moreno
1984	Calder Park, VIC	Roberto Moreno

 

The Adelaide Years: 1985 to 1995

Adelaide’s decade as host was the Grand Prix at its most theatrical, a genuine season finale that decided championships rather than opening them. It ran through the city’s parklands on a circuit fast enough that the front straight was named the Brabham Straight in honour of Australia’s own three-time champion. Rosberg won the inaugural 1985 race. The following year produced one of the most dramatic title deciders in the sport’s history, when Nigel Mansell’s tyre failure at high speed handed the championship to Alain Prost, one of the great what-might-have-been moments in Formula 1, the kind of ending that still gets replayed whenever people argue about the sport’s cruellest title deciders. Ayrton Senna took his final win at Adelaide in 1993, before Nigel Mansell triumphed in 1994, the race remembered for the collision between Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill that decided that year’s title in Schumacher’s favour. The 1991 race, run in torrential rain, was stopped after just 14 laps, the shortest championship race by distance at the time. Damon Hill won the Adelaide farewell in 1995 by two laps, closing out a circuit that gave the sport ten years of drama and a genuine claim to being one of the great street circuits Formula 1 has raced on, one that Adelaide locals still speak about with real affection today.

The Move to Melbourne

The Kennett Government’s push to bring the Grand Prix to Melbourne was one of the biggest wins in Australian major-events history, and it came at Adelaide’s expense. The announcement in 1993 was met with real anger in South Australia, which had built a decade of civic identity around the race. Melbourne’s first race followed in 1996, with Damon Hill completing the Adelaide-to-Melbourne double while rookie Jacques Villeneuve, on debut, took pole position and led 50 of the 58 laps before an oil leak cost him the win, a cruel way to lose what would have been an extraordinary debut victory.

Since 1996, the race has been Formula 1’s season opener in all but seven years: the Commonwealth Games forced it later in the calendar in 2006 and 2010, COVID cancelled the race outright in 2020 and 2021, and it briefly slotted in as the third round from 2022 to 2024 before reclaiming its usual opening slot. The 2020 cancellation is its own small piece of history, and one of the more sobering moments in the event’s calendar: fans were literally at the gates on race morning, practice sessions were being run, and the weekend was called off in real time as the scale of the pandemic became clear. It remains the clearest marker of just how suddenly the world changed that year, and it’s a reminder of how much of the modern Melbourne era has actually been shaped by things happening well outside the cockpit.

For the full detail on the venue itself, from corner names to grandstands, see our Albert Park Circuit Guide.

Every Championship Winner, 1985 to Today

Forty-two scheduled runnings, forty actually held, with 2020 and 2021 cancelled. Two circuits, and a genuinely wide spread of winners. 25 different drivers have taken the top step at an Australian Grand Prix since 1985, across 9 different constructors, a level of variety that’s rare for a single fixture on the F1 calendar. Across both host cities, McLaren lead on 12 wins to Ferrari’s 11, the only two constructors in double figures. Narrow it to Albert Park alone and the order flips: Ferrari have won there 10 times to McLaren’s 7. Williams and Mercedes follow on 5 apiece. That spread is part of what makes this race’s history worth telling properly, no single team has ever been able to treat it as a formality.

Year	Circuit	Winner	Constructor
2026	Melbourne	George Russell	Mercedes
2025	Melbourne	Lando Norris	McLaren
2024	Melbourne	Carlos Sainz Jr.	Ferrari
2023	Melbourne	Max Verstappen	Red Bull
2022	Melbourne	Charles Leclerc	Ferrari
2021	Melbourne	Not held, cancelled	Not held
2020	Melbourne	Not held, cancelled	Not held
2019	Melbourne	Valtteri Bottas	Mercedes
2018	Melbourne	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari
2017	Melbourne	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari
2016	Melbourne	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes
2015	Melbourne	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes
2014	Melbourne	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes
2013	Melbourne	Kimi Räikkönen	Lotus
2012	Melbourne	Jenson Button	McLaren
2011	Melbourne	Sebastian Vettel	Red Bull
2010	Melbourne	Jenson Button	McLaren
2009	Melbourne	Jenson Button	Brawn GP
2008	Melbourne	Lewis Hamilton	McLaren
2007	Melbourne	Kimi Räikkönen	Ferrari
2006	Melbourne	Fernando Alonso	Renault
2005	Melbourne	Giancarlo Fisichella	Renault
2004	Melbourne	Michael Schumacher	Ferrari
2003	Melbourne	David Coulthard	McLaren
2002	Melbourne	Michael Schumacher	Ferrari
2001	Melbourne	Michael Schumacher	Ferrari
2000	Melbourne	Michael Schumacher	Ferrari
1999	Melbourne	Eddie Irvine	Ferrari
1998	Melbourne	Mika Häkkinen	McLaren
1997	Melbourne	David Coulthard	McLaren
1996	Melbourne	Damon Hill	Williams
1995	Adelaide	Damon Hill	Williams
1994	Adelaide	Nigel Mansell	Williams
1993	Adelaide	Ayrton Senna	McLaren
1992	Adelaide	Gerhard Berger	McLaren
1991	Adelaide	Ayrton Senna	McLaren
1990	Adelaide	Nelson Piquet	Benetton
1989	Adelaide	Thierry Boutsen	Williams
1988	Adelaide	Alain Prost	McLaren
1987	Adelaide	Gerhard Berger	Ferrari
1986	Adelaide	Alain Prost	McLaren
1985	Adelaide	Keke Rosberg	Williams

 

Moments That Made Melbourne

A few races define the Albert Park era beyond who won them. 1998 brought the McLaren team-orders controversy. Mika Häkkinen was allowed past teammate David Coulthard after a mid-race mix-up over pit signals. It’s an episode that still gets replayed whenever team orders become a talking point today.

2002 gave Melbourne its best local anecdote. Ralf Schumacher launched over the top of Rubens Barrichello at Turn 1, in a first-lap accident that briefly halted the race, meanwhile a young Mark Webber scored points on debut for Minardi, in front of his home crowd. Watching, as it happens, was a 12-year-old Daniel Ricciardo, who would end up racing at the same circuit himself little more than a decade later, a small detail that makes the story feel like it was always heading somewhere.

2009 saw Brawn GP win its first ever race here. It was the opening chapter of one of the sport’s most remarkable underdog stories. The team had been assembled from Honda’s ashes just months earlier, and went on to win both championships that year, a fairytale result that started right here at Albert Park.

2014 brought the hybrid era’s difficult opening chapter, and Ricciardo’s home podium struck from the record. 2016 saw a heavy crash for Fernando Alonso that he walked away from remarkably unscathed, one of the more frightening accidents Albert Park has produced. 2022 marked the race’s return after the pandemic, with record crowds that signalled just how much appetite there was to have it back.

And in 2026, George Russell led home a Mercedes one-two. Melbourne’s run of different winners stretched to seven straight years, a genuine rarity in an era when the same handful of teams tend to dominate the front of the grid.

Australian Grand Prix Records

Three numbers get confused more than any others at Albert Park, so here they are side by side. The race lap record, the fastest lap ever driven during a Grand Prix itself, belongs to Charles Leclerc at 1:19.813, set in 2024. The outright qualifying lap record, the fastest lap ever driven around the circuit under any conditions, belongs to Lando Norris at 1:15.096, set in Q3 for the 2025 race. His teammate Oscar Piastri was just 0.084 seconds behind him that day, at 1:15.180, the second-fastest lap in the circuit’s history and the fastest ever driven by an Australian. And the fastest lap of the most recent race, set by Max Verstappen at 1:22.091 in 2026, sits well outside both records, a reminder of how much slower the new generation of cars has been in its first season under the sport’s active-aero regulations.

Record	Detail
Race lap record	Charles Leclerc, 1:19.813 (2024)
Outright / qualifying record	Lando Norris, 1:15.096 (2025)
Most recent race’s fastest lap	Max Verstappen, 1:22.091 (2026)

For context on how long records tend to stand at Albert Park, Schumacher’s previous race lap record, set in 2004, held for 18 years before it fell. On current evidence, Leclerc’s mark looks set to last a while yet.

Win records tell their own story. Schumacher’s four championship-era wins remain unmatched by any other driver. Ferrari’s 10 wins at Albert Park make it comfortably the most successful constructor in the circuit’s Formula 1 history, well clear of McLaren on 7.

The Australian Curse

No Australian driver has won, or stood on the podium at, a championship-era Australian Grand Prix, at Adelaide or at Melbourne. The best any Australian has managed is fourth, first by Mark Webber in 2012, then by Daniel Ricciardo in 2016 and 2018 and Oscar Piastri in 2024. It’s one of the more painful running stories in Australian motorsport, made sharper by the fact that Australians used to win this race constantly in the pre-championship years, back when the field was smaller and largely local. The gap between that era and this one is really a story about Formula 1 going global, and about just how much harder the sport has become to win outright as its depth has grown. As the sport grew from a domestic pursuit into a worldwide championship, the odds of a home driver topping the field on home soil got longer every year.

Daniel Ricciardo came agonisingly close in 2014, finishing on the podium only to have the result struck from the record over a fuel-flow infringement, a result that’s still argued about in Melbourne to this day, usually by someone who insists the penalty was harsh even now. Oscar Piastri’s 2025 home race ended with his charge unravelling in the Turn 12 gravel, and his 2026 attempt didn’t deliver a podium either, with the race won by George Russell. Every near miss adds another layer to a story that’s now spanned four decades of championship racing in Australia, and counting.

There is one small, unofficial exception, and it’s a good one. After Webber’s fifth place on debut in 2002, AGPC chairman Ron Walker insisted he and team owner Paul Stoddart climb onto the podium once the official ceremony had finished, because the crowd would not let it go. Webber has since pointed out the irony: it remains the only time he has stood on the Albert Park podium.

The contrast with the pre-championship era couldn’t be sharper. Davison, Whiteford and Jones all won their home Grand Prix outright when the race still belonged to Australians, a version of the story that today’s fans mostly only know from records like the table above. It’s a genuinely strange thing to sit with: a country that dominated its own motor race for half a century, only to watch it become one of the hardest results in the sport to achieve the moment it started mattering on the world stage. For the full story of the drivers chasing it, read our Australian F1 Drivers article.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who has won the most Australian Grands Prix?

Michael Schumacher, with four championship-era wins. Lex Davison also won four, though all of his came in the pre-championship era, between 1954 and 1961.

Who won the 2026 Australian Grand Prix?

George Russell, leading home a Mercedes one-two.

When did the Australian Grand Prix start?

1928, at Phillip Island. It’s been a part of the Formula 1 World Championship since 1985.

Where was it held before Melbourne?

Adelaide, from 1985 to 1995. Before that, the race rotated between venues across the country.

Has an Australian ever won the Australian Grand Prix?

Not in the championship era. In the pre-championship years, Australians won regularly, with Alan Jones’s 1980 win at Calder the last time it happened.

The Road Ahead

Albert Park’s contract runs to 2035, and 2028 will mark a century since that first race at Phillip Island, a milestone the Australian Grand Prix Corporation is already starting to plan around. Melbourne has now hosted the Grand Prix for 30 years, and attendance keeps climbing toward half a million, a genuinely remarkable trajectory for an event that once had to fight just to keep its place on the calendar. The history reads better from a grandstand than it does from a screen. View our Australian Grand Prix 2027 packages to be part of the next chapter.