THE 2018 F1 season goes green in Australia next weekend with Britain’s Lewis Hamilton the man to beat, and his Mercedes the car to be ahead of for those with any ambition of taking the title.

For David Coulthard, who will be working once again this season with Channel 4, the first Grand Prix in Melbourne will give us an idea of what to expect over the season. And the Scot, a 13-time Formula One race winner, reckons the Hamilton/Mercedes axis is still the best around. That is not to say others might not come closer to the reigning and four-time world champion this time around.

“The form guide would show Lewis and Mercedes as being the leaders, and, with an ability to pick up where they left off from the previous season. A lot of that is powered – excusing the pun – by the fact they have had the most efficient and reliable hybrid power unit. And they’ve had a good chassis as well. But then it’s down to driver ability and desire. And Lewis has those qualities in abundance.”

Coulthard explained: “You get these periods where you get a level of dominance in the sport – be it McLaren of the late 80s, Williams in the 90s, and Red Bull not so long ago – when you get three or four years of one manufacturer being ahead of the rest. Right now, it’s Mercedes’ time.

“That would make his team-mate Valtteri Bottas a potential threat. He does have the same equipment, but does he have that will to win? Bottas isn’t the new boy now. He’s had a year with the team, they know each other now. Lewis has been there for years; he’ll swing past the garage, say what he thinks he needs, and goes and does it, because he was, and is, the No 1.

“It takes drivers new to a team a year to build up that kind of relationship. It isn’t inconceivable that, given the car he has under him, that Bottas becomes a threat to Lewis’ dominance, not just in the team but on the grid.

“Mercedes themselves will have an eye on Bottas stepping up. If Lewis didn’t win or finish, they’d want Valtteri there, not a Ferrari or a Red Bull. However, that is a possibility. Because it does feel – looking at the winter testing and the regulations being in their fifth year – we could get a closing up of the grid.

“Sauber struggled last year, but start 2018 with the current Ferrari engine. That, in theory, pushes the back of the grid closer to the front. The entire field then becomes more of an influence on the result, because things like pitting at will and in to clean air become factors. I think we should be getting excited that Ferrari set first and second fastest times during winter testing. Once we get to Melbourne, we are then into limited running, and you don’t really want to be finding out how good – or bad – your car is on low fuel on Saturday morning.

“I think it will be closer – I think we hope it will be.”

Who, then, will be the best of the rest, if not the best come the last of the 21 GP’s in Abu Dhabi in November?

“I think Sebastian Vettel and Ferrari could mount the biggest challenge, especially after 2017,” Coulthard said. “They are a stronger team because they’ve kept the design team together rather than making sure they have the same driver combination. They had a very good car last year, which, in a number of circumstances, was the best car on some race weekends. They could have been right in the hunt last season, had Seb not made a couple of big mistakes.

“He would have won in Baku had he not had to serve a drive-through penalty after an altercation with Hamilton, and then in Singapore, having been on pole, he was the catalyst for the accident that put Kimi Raikkonen out of the race, as well as himself a few corners later.

“In sport these things happen, and in hindsight you can see the importance of these things in the context of the championship overall. But Ferrari were in the mix and they’ll challenge again.

“But the challenge will come from Seb, not Kimi. While Vettel was always trying, always pushing, you never got the impression that Kimi would suddenly win a race, never mind two or three.”

And what about his old team, Red Bull?

“In their first year, Daniel Ricciardo generally had the upper hand. Last year, most would say Max Verstappen was the stronger runner.

“It is though one of the strongest pairings out there; they are quick, and they have another season behind them experience- wise. It’s going to be fascinating now to see which one puts down a marker – or it could be both. You never know.”

Channel 4 is the home of free-to-air coverage of Formula 1 in the UK with live coverage of 10 Grands Prix and comprehensive highlights of every race weekend. Highlights of the Australian Grand Prix on Channel 4 on 25 March.