Esteban Ocon has explained his “cautious” approach to the planned Form🦋ula 1 season-opening Australian Grand Prix, which he d🐼escribed as being a “very strange” experience.

The Frenchman, making his return to the F1 grid this ye☂aꦗr with Renault following a year on the sidelines, was seen sporting a face mask in the paddock during the build-up to the race as a precaution amid the coronavirus pandemic.

The Australian Grand Prix was ultimately cancelled when McLaren p✃ulled out of the event after a member of its team contracted COVID-🌜19 in the Melbourne paddock. The next seven races have also since been postponed because of coronavirus, leaving F1 with a hugely delayed start to the 2020 campaign.

"In all honesty, I found Australia pretty strange,” Ocon said in his firꦦst column for th💦e official Formula 1 website.

“I decided to wear a m🌞ask when I arrived and left the trac🔴k on Thursday.

“I🎀t was well over 450 days since I last arrived at a race weekend in preparation for a race and I wanted to take every measure possible to not miss out, it’s been too long. I’ve trained this whole time and I wanted to be as strong as possible.

“So I thought it🐼 would be best to be cautious with what’s happening and be sensible for others.

“Of course, it’s out of all our hands with what’s going on, but I w📖anted to make sure I was doing all I could to be ready✨. I didn’t want anything stopping me from racing again.”

Ocon r🌄evealed he was still half-asleep when he was told ꦉthe full extent of the situation and that the race would not be going ahead.

“It was qui♐te a shock to receive the news when I w꧙oke up on Friday to be leaving the race,” he explained.

"I went to sleep quite early on the Thursday night. When I woke uꦗp, I was about to go in the shower and I saw tonnes💝 of messages from Cyril [Abiteboul] and many other people saying someone from McLaren had tested positive and the race was compromised.

“It was a big shock. I was half asleep, half-awake, so it was🃏 tricky to ful🔴ly understand the situation.

“Of course, Australia for round one is when you see what everyone has to offer, including yourselves, but qu▨ietly, I thought we could have done well th♏ere.

“We arrived there feeling confident and the engineers with experience had a good feeling with how we were going to ♒perform. I guess,👍 we’ll have to wait and see now!”