The Albert Park Circuit is a motorsport street circuit around Albert Park Lake, three kilometres south of central Melbourne.
Accommodation:
The track is very close to the Melbourne City Centre, where there are plenty of hotels.
If hotels are not your thing or are too expensive, Melbourne offers a whole plethora of Airbnb accommodations around the CBD area. These range from full apartments where the host is remotely accessible through Airbnb, or bedrooms that offer a shared kitchen and bathroom. These can generally be significantly cheaper and just as convenient to reach transportation services to Albert Park/MSAC
Getting to the track:
If flying into Melbourne from international locations, Tullamarine Airport offers entry into the city via the Skybus, which is a direct bus transfer service from Tullamarine to Southern Cross Station. Cost (in 2018) is $18 for a one-way trip, and $35 for a return trip. Children under the age of 16 travel free when accompanied by an adult. Uber and other ride-sharing services are readily available from Tullamarine, with prices ranging from around $30-$40 for a ride to the CBD.
Domestic flights arriving into Avalon Airport only have the Skybus as the most sensible option to reach the CBD. Fares for a one way trip cost $22 for one-way, $42 for a round-trip. The ride generally takes 50 minutes to arrive at Southern Cross Station.
Trams run free for ticket holders from Melbourne Southern Cross train station. The most popular route is the 96 tram, which takes you to gates 1 and 2, along with the gates closest to most of the popular grandstands and GA areas as well as the F1 village area where all the stores and entertainment are. Gate 1 isn't accessible with GA tickets over the weekend. Best to use Gate 2. The tram journey itself takes 15 minutes, but budget in more time as there are often long queues at the tram stop. Trams for gates 5,8, 9 and 10 can be caught on Swanston Street between Melbourne Central and Flinders Street Station.
If you have tickets to the Waite and Clark grandstands, taking any of the trams that head down St Kilda road from Flinders Street Railway Station is much faster. Note that you will need a Myki smartcard if you catch a tram service apart from ones designated as a shuttle to and from the circuit.
Seating:
General admission tickets get you great value to experience all that the Australian Grand Prix has to offer, especially for concession holders. This gives you access for the whole weekend (Thursday through to Sunday) to nearly all locations of the track where spectators are able to view on-track action. If you're not a fan of sitting on the grass, picnic chairs or rugs are highly recommended.
Food:
Most of the food places are behind the main straight grandstands, with a couple of stores around turns 3/4/5 as well. Its what you expect of sporting event food, not particularly cheap. There are Shoey bars all over the circuit, serving beer from a shoe-shaped can cooler.
What to avoid:
Remember to bring sunscreen and plenty of water, it can often be very warm and sunny even in March.
Don't forget hearing protection, the support categories can be very loud, especially the speed comparison where a V10 engined Minardi F1 car does laps.
Its not necessarily cheapest to buy merchandise at the track, there's plenty of pop-up stores scattered around the city centre which may be better value.
If you're aiming for GA, I would not recommend the hill at the exit of turn 2 unless you get there extremely early. It gets unbelievably crowded and unless you're at the top of the hill you won't see much, only the airboxes of the cars as they go past since they exit the corner next to the barrier.
Don't drive to the circuit. Just don't.
Don't enter the track until all the F1 cars are off the circuit...
When the race concludes, try to exit through alternative exits. The main exit is extremely packed with no officials enforcing queues.
Misc:
If you are looking for a GA spot, the most popular choice is the hill at turns 9/10 and at turn 11/12, which offer an excellent view of the track. The areas at both the apex and exit of turn 3 is my personal pick, you can catch a lot of overtaking into that corner and there's a screen which you can follow the race on. However, you really need to get there early, I camped there for about 5 hours this year.
On Friday there is a "fan forum" thing, where drivers and team principals go on stage and talk about stuff. If you're lucky, then you might be able to ask them questions.
There are heaps of support categories providing on-track action when Formula One is not on. These range from the newly introduced Melbourne 400 Supercars Championship event, as well as GT/Sportscars races all throughout the day.
All throughout the weekend will provide a change for some novelty events on track, such as Ferrari tribute laps, and comparisons of speed of past F1 racers with sportscars.
Off-track activities are plenty, with tons of things to keep you busy while Formula One is on break. These include pit stop challenges and on-stage performances from celebrities.
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