Formula One Vault

PRIXVIEW – Chinese Grand Prix

Round five sees F1 return to Shanghai following a five-year hiatus because of the Covid restrictions for the Chinese Grand Prix, for the twentieth anniversary of the first Grand Prix in the country. The commercial capital of China hosted the 1,000^th Grand Prix last time out in 2019.

The design of the circuit is based on the Chinese character Shang (上), the first character in the name of the city Shanghai, meaning “above” or “ascend”. This has created a high-speed and high downforce circuit with multiple straights and tight following corners. One of the most eye conic corners is Turns One to Three, drivers head into a tight long almost circle which can create drama on the opening laps.

Designed by Herman Tilke at the time it opened in 2004 it was the most expensive circuit built for F1. The 3.387-mile circuit features a wide mix of corners and some of the trickiest corners of the season, including the almost snail circle at Turn One to Four, one of the longest straights of the season and the best places for overtaking.

The almost three-quarter of a mile back straight, is the equivalent to eleven football pitches laid end to end, or the same length as three and a half of the world’s biggest aircraft carriers Turn Fourteen is a hairpin at the end of the straight, the second gear corner is a prime overtaking spot as DRS is available in the run-up to the corner. Turn Sixteen requires early braking so you can carry as much speed to the line.

It’s a real test for both drivers and engineers to find the right compromise between the two. This gives drivers’ multiple opportunities to follow and attempt to overtake, but getting the car stopped towards the end of the straight can be challenging with the longest straight in the sport.

Shanghai can often be a race full of action because of its wide-open nature less gravel traps and tricky nature. Also not having raced here since 2019 the data isn’t as relevant not only because of the regulation change but also because the circuit was built on paddy field and a swamp and there have been bumps in the past.

The Chinese Grand Prix was due to debut in 1999 in Zhuhai, Guangdong, however the 2.6-mile circuit failed to meet the standards of the FIA which led to a five-year delay and the race moving to a new circuit in Shanghai for 2004. The circuit was widely praised by drivers and fans.

In the first five years on the calendar, it often was one of the final races of the season. Rubens Barrichello won the race from pole after Michael Schumacher started from the pit lane and then had a scrappy race with incidents with other drivers before losing his tyre as did his brother Ralf, before being lapped. In the final laps, Barrichello managed his advantage over his pursuers, who approached the Ferrari driver but never seriously threatened him.

Shanghai hosted the final race of the following season, Fernanda Alonso had already won the title and took the race win from pole four seconds ahead of Kimi Raikkonen. Alonso dominated the race, taking a lights-to-flag victory, capping a best-ever season for Renault which included victories in both titles.

The following season saw Schumacher take what would be his final win, after taking the lead following a tactical battle in the middle of the race between Renault and Ferrari. The German eventually passed Alonso for his final win following the last round of stops as Alonso ran out of laps to close the gap and take the lead.

2007 race would ultimately cost Lewis Hamilton the chance of becoming the first driver to win the title in his debut season. Leading the race and the championship, the McLaren driver pitted but went off becoming beached in the small gravel trap after going wide.

That led to him retiring and would come Sao Paulo cost him the title by a point. While Räikkönen eventually came home to win the race, and eventually the title, comfortably from Alonso, who after having pulled out a considerable lead from Massa was later pulled back until the Brazilian finished less than three seconds behind him.

In 2009 the race moved to its now, baring the Covid years, traditional April springtime slot. This would be a defining race in Red Bull’s history, as Sebastian Vettel taking the team’s first win in mixed conditions, as both Felipe Massa and Hamilton struggled on track. While Brawn which had dominated the first two races appeared to struggle in the cooler conditions.

Jenson Button would win ahead of Hamilton by a second and a half as Mercedes returned to the podium in cloudy and damp conditions taking the lead of the championship. It was the first time since 1969 that two Englishmen finished one-two, while Nico Rosberg gave Mercedes their first podium since 1955 in the team’s third race since returning.

Hamilton returned to the top step, in the second of six wins in 2011 becoming the first multiple winners in Shanghai ahead of both Red Bulls. That was despite the Englishman starting from the pit lane and over cutting Vettel with a mid-race stop he went on to overtake with four laps to go.

Rosberg would also give Mercedes their first win since Monza 1955, his first win since 2005 Bahrain in GP2 and his first win in F1 in dominating style ahead of both McLaren’s. The race itself was characterised by intense battling throughout the field and by high reliability with 23 of 24 starters finishing the race, Schumacher only retiring thanks to a bodged pit stop.

Alonso would take one of his, to date, final victories for Ferrari in 2013. The Spaniard taking the lead from Vettel around half distance and retained the lead following the final stops, and built a ten-second lead to win on his two-hundredth start.

2014 and the beginning of the hybrid era saw Mercedes begin a run of five wins in six years four coming from Hamilton and the other from Rosberg. Hamilton won comfortably like in 2008 from pole leading every lap of the race and beating Rosberg by eighteen seconds.

Another grand slam for the Englishman followed in 2015, Hamilton is a master of Shanghai he managed to control the race and build a comfortable lead of ten seconds towards the end of the race. He won ahead of Rosberg and Vettel. Rosberg took his second win in Shanghai in 2016 from pole.

Hamilton meanwhile was on the back the top step in 2017 beating Vettel after the Ferrari driver lost out during the change from inters to slicks under a VSC while Max Verstappen came from sixteenth. Hamilton’s winning from pole allowed him to equal or pass several records.

Daniel Ricciardo won the race in 2018 after overtaking Bottas in the closing stages as teammate Verstappen pushed Vettel wide, resulting in both of them going off and a ten-second penalty.

Race & Circuit Guide

Fast facts

• Michael Schumacher recorded his last race victory at the Shanghai circuit in 2006. The Chinese Grand Prix was also the venue for the first victory of the Red Bull team (2009) and Nico Rosberg (2012).
• After their first victory in 2009, the British national anthem was incorrectly played on the podium for Red Bull. Though the team’s base is in Britain, the team itself is registered with the Austrian national racing authority, meaning the Austrian national anthem should have been played.0
• Mark Webber’s grid position of 18th in 2011 is the furthest back on the grid a podium finish has come from at the Shanghai circuit. He gained 15 places in the race to stand on the final step of the rostrum.
• In both 2017 and 2018, Mercedes led the Constructors’ Championship by a single point after the Chinese Grand Prix. In 2006, Renault also led the way by just one point after the Shanghai race.
• Lewis Hamilton’s unfortunate DNF here in 2007 is the only time the polesitter at the Chinese Grand Prix has failed to finish the race.
• The 2016 race saw 161 overtakes the then record which was surpassed by Zandvoort last season

Event timetable

Sprint Format

• Friday lunchtime sixty minutes of free practice
• Friday late afternoon sprint qualifying
  • SQ1 twelve minutes with the bottom five cars being knocked out
  • SQ2 ten minutes with the bottom five cars being knocked out
  • SQ3 eight minutes with the top ten fighting for pole
• Saturday morning
  • 100km + 1 lap sprint in Shanghai nineteen laps
• Saturday afternoon Grand Prix qualifying
• Sunday afternoon the Grand Prix
  • 300km + 1 lap in Shanghai fifty-six laps

Now that the two Sprint sessions don’t break apart Grand Prix Qualifying and the Grand Prix, there are two parc fermé periods: between Sprint qualifying and Sprint, and between Grand Prix Qualifying and the Grand Prix.

That means any data our drivers and engineers find during the short-form race can impact setup changes ahead of Qualifying, giving us the best chance of a high starting position for Sunday’s Grand Prix.

Teams are as always allowed to change set-up if conditions change from dry to wet or vice versa between qualifying/sprint qualifying and race/sprint without penalties

What happened in 2019?

The 1,000th world championship race took the sport to Shanghai, surely this circuit would be the weekend where Ferrari could fight back given the teams strong testing form. The long straights and high downforce in Barcelona should bring Ferrari into the mix, but could they beat Lewis Hamilton?

Despite his usual good form in Shanghai, it was Valtteri Bottas who just beat Hamilton by twenty-three of a second to take pole position. Mercedes again had the upper hand, Sebastian Vettel was three-tenths off with Charles Leclerc admitting the team didn’t have the pace. Red Bull meanwhile messed up their timing up and both drivers failed to set a time in the closing moments of Q3.

Hamilton made a better start getting passed Bottas to lead into the first corner, the five-times champion looked unstoppable. Leclerc got passed Vettel before the team instructed him to let Vettel back pass.

The drama was never far away in the midfield, at the hairpin Daniil Kvyat lost the rear of the car, then bounced off the rear of Carlos Sainz. That sent Sainz torpedoing into his teammate Lando Norris, earning the Russian a penalty and pushing Sainz out the points, as well as causing Norris’s retirement.

But no one was able to stop Hamilton, winner of the 900th and 1,000th Grand Prix, while it wasn’t the thriller, we had in Bahrain in 2014 or as controversial as the 800th in Singapore in 2008.

What to watch for?

Shanghai is a circuit which is good for racing it’s a high-speed technical circuit and allows cars to follow closely. We have very different regulations to when we were last here five years ago which is a lifetime ago in F1, but this circuit tends to favour the faster cars in a straight line and mechanical grip in the corners.

This circuit flows well, but FP1 will be a very busy hour I understand why we have the sprint format this weekend because of the racing is normally good the teams effectively have no useable data given we haven’t raced here in five years. On top of that, the circuit has since been resurfaced, meaning very little existing data is valid and the weekend is harder to prepare.

only have an hour of practice before sprint qualifying. We also have a new format for the sprint and a regulation change, between the sprint and GP qualifying after checks are made by the FIA teams allowed to change the cars, but not between the sprint qualifying and the sprint.

Pirelli have cited this reason for maybe going a bit conservative on tyre selection as they gone in the middle of the range with the C2, C3 and C4 tyres. No one has had access to this circuit since 2019, as we know China until the early part of last year had very strict COVID measures the relaxation just too late to reinstate last years race.

Max Verstappen and Red Bull are looking very much like the team to beat, in Bahrain and Jeddah circuits which I believe are closer in terms of their high speed and downforce to Shanghai. You need to believe now that Ferrari are the closest team to Red Bull, the question is how do they close the gap?

Ferrari is looking as if they could be heading to no-mans land in second as the season progresses unless Mercedes and McLaren can regularly up the game and maintain the same sort of gap. Carlos Sainz, I feel is the driver in that group who is performing at his best at the moment, Charles Leclerc has accepted he isn’t doing good enough to beat Sainz it will be interesting that plays out over the coming races.

McLaren looks in a really good position to fight ahead of Mercedes, Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri are looking very evenly matched to fight the Ferraris this season. I think unless Mercedes is able to up their game soon they could have that edge all season, its as if going to eb and flow all season. Mercedes I feel need a good weekend after a tough start where they look to have slipped back.

2019 vs 2018 Race Data

Tyres