Eddie Irvine's maiden grand prix win, at the Australian Grand Prix, was a dream come true - not for the Ulster-man but his friends. "My friend from Japan called me and said she had a dream that I was going to win the Australian Grand Prix and then an ex-girlfriend rang and said she had had a dream that I was going to win. You can't argue with that can you?"

Irvine seized the initiative for Ferrari early in the race, after team-mate Michael Schumacher stalled at the start of the second formation lap and had to begin the race from the back of the grid, but admitted that the problematic start had caught him by surprise. "We had problems at the start," he said. "We have a sequence of things we do at the start of a race and I was a bit worried when that didn't happen. But I got past Heinz Harald [Frentzen] and then just pushed like hell. The McLarens pulled away, but I was letting them, I wanted them to exhaust themselves!" Irvine's first victory came in his 82nd grand prix and his 50th for Ferrari.

"It's fantastic to do it with Ferrari and fantastic for all the people who helped me along the way," said the Ulster-man. "They know who they are. If I thanked them all we'd be here for hours. I needed a lot of help along the way. I'm also glad my dad didn't come to this, he never comes to my first wins!"

He reserved the greatest praise for the Ferrari engineers who had prepared his car through the weekend.

"My engineer, Luca, and I, we went out our own way, did the things we wanted with the car. The car's beautiful. It's a little nervous but otherwise great - it's the best Ferrari I've driven. It's good that Michael had done all that testing to get the car to this stage, he sweats and I get all the glory, I'll take that! Second-placed Heinz-Harald Frentzen admitted that he had had trouble challenging for the lead. "I was a bit worried when Eddie started. Every time I'm on the grid with Eddie there's burning rubber and parts flying, but I thought at least he's in front of me, so he can't hit me from behind!

"It is the strongest race I've ever seen from Eddie, he was going like hell," he added. "I thought his tyres would go away from him but he just kept going and from then on I just tried to do my own race and I'm very pleased to get six points for Jordan and for me and it's great to be on the podium."

Jordan team owner Eddie Jordan was delighted with Frentzen's drive. "Today was great - our best ever start to the championship," he said. "It's very satisfying to be second here in the race and in the constructors' championship. Heinz Harald did a remarkable job. He seems to enjoy the workings of our team and I believe we have a real champion here." The day belonged to Irvine, though, and as he left, his thoughts turned to the world championship and to the team orders that usually see him giving way to his team-mate.

"All I need is a few lucky races in which I win and he doesn't finish," he laughed. "And if, halfway through the season, I had 40 points on the board and he had 30, I wonder what would happen then?"