Hamilton: Ferrari did the better job

Lewis Hamilton accepted Ferrari outdid Mercedes after the Scuderia's superior strategy helped Sebastian Vettel to victory at the Australian Grand Prix. Hamilton had looked set to win from pole until Ferrari capitalised under the Virtual Safety Car to sneak victory in Melbourne Park for a second year in a row.

Romain Grosjean's retirement on lap 25 prompted a VSC period, with Ferrari reacting sharply to pit Vettel from the lead, with Hamilton having taken a service shorty before.

Hamilton immediately took to the radio, race engineer Pete Bonnington confirming that Mercedes had been caught out.

Vettel had earlier struggled off the line, holding third position but failing to catch Hamilton and Kimi Raikkonen, but the German did not relent once in the overall lead of the race.

Hamilton had set a new lap record in taking his seventh pole position in Australia - another record - but was left to count the cost of his team's failure.

"It's been an incredible weekend, to arrive and have a big performance," Hamilton said on the podium. "Big congrats to Sebastian and Ferrari, they did better job. We've got to go back to the drawing board.

HAM: "Congrats to Seb and Ferrari, they did the better job today. I had great pace, and I was able to apply some pressure at the end... it's an awesome circuit but it's so hard to pass" #AusGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/ByCZXHPpeo — Formula 1 (@F1) March 25, 2018

"I had great pace, I was able to apply pressure at the end, it's an awesome circuit but so hard to overtake.

"With the cars being close at the end, it was live to fight another day, save the engine and try to regain the points later on."

Vettel admitted he had "lost connection" to Hamilton and Raikkonen, but came to life as soon as the VSC was activated with him in the lead.

He said: "I was praying for a safety car and one didn't come, a Haas stopped in turn two and when I saw it I was full of adrenaline even though the race is frozen, they told me it's really close with Lewis."