A hard-fought one-two finish for Mercedes AMG Petronas in a tense Chinese Grand Prix, as Lewis Hamilton leads home Nico Rosberg at the Shanghai International Circuit.
Lewis took his second consecutive Chinese Grand Prix victory - his fourth in Shanghai and the 35th of his Formula One Career. The result also marked his second Grand Chelem; pole, victory, fastest lap and leading from lights to flag. Nico claimed his fourth Chinese Grand Prix podium, the 29th of his career, in second place. Today's result marks the 31st Silver Arrows Formula One victory and 18th one-two finish from 111 Grand Prix Starts. Both drivers ran a two stop strategy of option / option / prime, stopping on laps 15 / 31 (Nico) and 14 / 33 (Lewis).
Toto Wolff: That was a great victory for the team but not an easy one; it was as challenging a race as we anticipated this morning. At the start of the race, we had the pace to pull a little gap to the Ferraris, but they were really strong today. We had to keep the Option tyres alive long enough and asked the guys to drive in an intelligent way. We chose to stick with the Option for the second stint and had to once again look after them to make them last far enough. We had some good communication during that part of the race, telling each driver what they needed to do to keep the one-two finish safe, and then we switched the pit-stop order for the final stops to protect Nico against Vettel by stopping him before Lewis. But it's clear from today's race what a big jump Ferrari has made over the winter. They were competitive in Malaysia, very strong here in the opening stint and they will be quick in Bahrain, too. Tonight, though, we can take a moment to appreciate a job well done - then get our heads down and start working for Bahrain next weekend.
Paddy Lowe: A fantastic result for the team to get another one-two finish. Malaysia was not only a good reminder of how difficult it is to win a Grand Prix, but also how much we don't like not winning! This weekend we went out there to improve on our performance and everybody did a great job to achieve that. Ferrari pushed us very hard indeed - especially in the first stint. We were pleasantly surprised to see that Sebastian (Vettel) was the first to fall away and pit on the first set of option tyres. We were then able to shadow his strategy and bring home the one-two. It certainly wasn't comfortable and the pressure was very much on both the drivers and the crew to nail the necessary laps and pit stops respectively. It was a great group performance and a well-earned team result.
Christian Horner, Team Principal: "It was a frustrating afternoon for us. Daniel had a poor start which put him in the back of the field. Daniil had a reasonable start; we took the different strategic option to start on the hard tyre which struggled to warm up in the early laps, and then his race was unfortunately cut prematurely short with an engine failure. Daniel recovered reasonably well to finish ninth after making some decent overtaking moves, but today's results were not what we were looking for."
Thierry Salvi, Renault: "Obviously a difficult weekend reliability-wise. Daniil had an ICE problem that is under investigation as we need to fully understand the issue before the next race. Daniel worked hard to recover from a very bad start. We have to stay focused on the reliability first to fix our issues as quickly as possible."
Felipe Massa finished fifth and Valtteri Bottas sixth in today's Chinese Grand Prix. Valtteri had a good start to overtake Felipe in the opening corners, only be retaken by Felipe before the end of the first lap as the pair battled with Kimi Raikkonen who was able to jump both cars. For the remainder of the race both drivers managed their tyres and the gaps to their rivals before the race concluded under the safety car.
Rob Smedley, Head of Performance Engineering: The team did a great job and maximised the performance of car. Fifth and sixth is accurate of the pace we had today. The pitstops were excellent and our race strategy was very good. We just need to continue working on the pace of the car.
Maurizio Arrivabene: "Today we ended up where we were supposed to be, so we can say we achieved our target. I never promised we'd be making miracles to anyone. Our strategy was to get as close as possible to Mercedes, getting ready to take advantage of any mistake from them. It was no surprise to see that they were strong. Temperatures were different from Friday's long runs, and this affected the behavior of the tyres. I am very happy for Kimi and, above all, I'm happy for Seb's third podium finish in a row. The boys in the garage did a splendid job, today it was easier to get things wrong than to make the right thing. I don't have the crystal ball and I can't tell what our competitors will do in the next races. But I do know that we'll try our best."
McLaren-Honda got both cars safely to the finish in today’s Chinese Grand Prix, Fernando and Jenson finishing 12th and 14th respectively.
Both drivers started on the Option tyre, but then ran constrasting two-stop strategies. Fernando switched to Primes at his first stop, which made his car oversteer, before fitting Options for the run to the flag. Despite a longer-than-planned stop (to clear debris from the rear wing), the softer tyre enabled him to make up significant ground to the cars in front.
Jenson, switched to a second set of Options at his first stop, setting a string of competitive midfield times, before ending the race on the Prime. He struggled with a lack of rear grip on the harder tyre, which dropped him into the sights of the Lotus of Pastor Maldonado, with whom he enjoyed a spirited tussle for many laps.
Into the closing laps, the action between Jenson and Pastor intensified, the pair passing and re-passing each other before colliding on the high-speed entry to Turn One. Pastor was pushed into a spin, and the contact broke off Jenson’s right-hand front-wing endplate. With his car’s balance not too badly compromised, Jenson made it to the finish line in 13th, but was later given a five-second penalty for his role in the Maldonado accident, which cost him an extra place.
The incident enabled the closely following Fernando to move cleanly past. When a late-race Safety Car period neutered the race, he came home 12th.
Eric Boullier, Racing director: "First, it’s a real positive for the entire team that we managed to get two cars to the finish with no issues whatsoever during the race. I think that’s a great reward for Honda, and we should congratulate them - today’s double-finish is the result of an enormous amount of hard work, much of which goes unappreciated, so I want to personally thank everybody working in Woking, Sakura and Milton Keynes for their efforts. It’s great that we’re starting to make solid progress.
"Second, our race pace showed further improvement: Jenson drove strongly in the middle stint, and Fernando was reasonably quick relative to the others in the final stint.
"Fighting towards the back of the pack still isn't where we want to be. We know we’re not in a position to fight for points yet - but, little by little, we’re getting there. And we must keep pushing to ensure there are improvements coming for every race."
Yasuhisa Arai, Honda R&D senior managing officer - chief officer of motorsport: "After today’s result, it finally feels like we’ve left this long period of winter testing behind us, and started the season proper.
"To get both cars to the finish of the race is one more item off our list, and we’ll now continue to push forward race by race to achieve the targets that we’ve set for ourselves.
"It may appear that we’ve only achieved a minor objective, and we know there’s a lot of work ahead, but the whole team deserves credit and thanks for all of their hard work."
Sahara Force India just missed out on points today with Sergio Perez finishing the Chinese Grand Prix in P11. Teammate Nico Hulkenberg retired on lap 10.
Robert Fernley, Deputy Team Principal: "We leave China with mixed feelings after a busy race. Sergio performed really well and was unlucky not to see his performance rewarded with a point. He was in a number of battles and was able to compete on more or less an equal footing with some of our direct rivals, which offers an encouraging view for the coming races. It was a shame to lose Nico due to a technical issue, especially as he had made very good progress in the first part of the race. Like Sergio, he was showing some really good pace and it would have been interesting to see where he would have finished had he continued. Throughout the weekend, there have been some encouraging signs regarding our performance and we can build on these as the development of the VJM08 continues."
Franz Tost (Team Principal): "The strategy with Max, who started on the Option tyres, worked very well and he had a very strong first lap where he was able to overtake a few rivals. From then onwards he drove very competitively and showed a great performance by overtaking and controlling his direct competitors. Unfortunately, with four laps to go, we had an issue with the drivetrain which meant he had to retire. We now have to investigate what the exact reason is. Regarding Carlos, it was a pity to see him spin after his good start. Later on, he lost some more valuable time because his gearbox went into neutral and we now have to find out why this happened. For sure the race result is quite disappointing for us because the team showed a good performance and I think that we would have deserved to finish at least with Max in eighth position. But this is Formula 1 and this is part of the game. As we know that we have a fast car, we are now looking forward to the Bahrain Grand Prix next week, where we will hopefully have a successful race weekend."
Cedrik Staudohar (Renault Sport F1 track support leader): "Until the race we had had a relatively good weekend. We had not made the most of qualifying, but Max' race pace was very impressive and he was able to catch and overtake several cars and move up into the top ten. Carlos had a spin early on in the race and struggled to recover with the traffic. Max' problem appears to be an ICE failure that happened suddenly. We've not had this problem before in either the dyno or on track and need to look into it for Bahrain."
Lotus F1 Team scored their first points of the season after Romain Grosjean came home in a strong seventh position in the Chinese Grand Prix. It wasn't so plain sailing for Pastor Maldonado who, despite a very strong start, suffered from braking issues and late race contact from Jenson Button, eventually retiring from the race with seven laps to go.
Romain started from P8 on the grid on his qualifying soft tyres, changing to new medium tyres on laps 12 and 32. Pastor started from P11 on the grid on his new soft compound tyres, changing to new medium tyres on laps 11 and 33. He retired from the race on lap 49.
Federico Gastaldi, Deputy Team Principal: "It feels great to gets points on the board and get that particular monkey off our back. Romain performed strongly all weekend and his seventh position is just reward. It wasn't such a good race for Pastor. He made a fantastic start, but suffered later in the race with braking and also racing contact from Jenson. The team is buoyed by Romain's result and we're looking forward to increasing our tally in Bahrain."
Alan Permane, Trackside Operations Director: "That was a solid race from us which illustrates where we expected to be fighting from the start of the year. Both cars were looking in very good shape for a seventh and eighth finish, and it was a great result from Romain meaning our first points on the board. We achieved our target of overtaking the Red Bull and both of the Saubers with Romain, who delivered everything required. Pastor had a much more difficult race despite a strong start and clearly had potential to finish comfortably in the top ten too."
Strong result for the Sauber F1 Team in the Chinese Grand Prix on the Shanghai International Circuit. Felipe Nasr and Marcus Ericsson started the race from ninth and tenth and finished eighth (Nasr) and tenth (Ericsson). With this result the team was able to have both cars in the points, the same as in the first race of the season in Australia. With a total of 19 points, the Sauber F1 Team was able to strenghten its fourth position in the Constructors‘ Championship.
Monisha Kaltenborn, Team Principal: "We can be very happy with this result. We started the race in a promising position, however, it was a tough Grand Prix. The drivers had to deliver a lot and fought very hard, and this was also against competitors who were faster over this weekend. A big compliment to the drivers and to the whole team who did a great job. We started the race from points positions, and we were able to bring both cars home in the points. It's great that we achieved our goal today."
Giampaolo Dall'Ara, Head of Track Engineering: "I think we can be satisfied with the result. We were targeting having both cars in the points and we finally achieved it. The race was not an easy one. The tyre strategy was open until the end, so that's why we decided to go for a split second stint. The drivers drove well and maximised the result. It's a good feeling for the whole team to be back in the points with both cars."
The Manor Marussia F1 Team achieved its target of a two-car finish in today's 2015 Formula 1 Chinese Grand Prix, with Will Stevens and Roberto Merhi taking the chequered flag in 15th and 16th positions. The team enjoyed a reliable weekend at the Shanghai International Circuit, improving car set-up step by step to extract more performance from the package and significantly reduce the gap to the midfield pack.
John Booth, Team Principal: "The whole team can feel really proud of what we've achieved in China this weekend. Our target was to get both cars to the chequered flag and it's a great feeling to have achieved that and to see the progress we've made in every session. The pace is also starting to come now - we were much better off in the race today - so there is a lot to be satisfied with and a lot to look forward to."
Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton has claimed his second win of the season in Shanghai, underlining his status as the most successful driver in the history of the Chinese Grand Prix with four wins, having started from pole. The top four used an identical two-stop strategy, with two opening stints on the soft tyre followed by a final stint on the medium tyre. Hamilton set the fastest lap of the race on the soft tyre during his second stint.
The soft-medium-medium strategy was used immediately behind them, but there were some other variations further down the field, including a three-stopper for Force India driver Sergio Perez, and a soft-medium-soft strategy for McLaren's Fernando Alonso as well as both Manor drivers, who finished the race.
The grand prix boiled down to an intense strategic battle between Mercedes and Ferrari, with Mercedes getting the most out of the medium tyre, and Ferrari showing some impressive stints on the soft tyre, putting the leaders under pressure.
Track temperatures gradually fell over the course of the race, making strategy and tyre behaviour hard to predict.
The race finished behind a safety car that came out with fewer than three laps to go, calling an end to the competitive action. The drivers had plenty of life left in their tyres at the end of the race, which they had saved for a final push, but they did not get the opportunity to charge all the way to the chequered flag.
Formula One now heads to Bahrain for the first double-header of the season, where the P Zero White medium and P Zero Yellow soft tyres have again been nominated.
Paul Hembery: "The falling track temperature over the course of the grand prix meant that the race tactics were quite hard to predict. This led to the frontrunners adopting very similar strategies, with some attempting to pit slightly earlier and gain track position with an ‘undercut'. In terms of pure performance, the tyres were in line with or in excess of our expectations."
Truth-O-Meter
We predicted that a two-stopper was the most likely scenario for the race, and this turned out to be the case. In our forecast, we said that after starting on soft, it would be quickest to stop for softs again on lap 12 and then mediums on lap 27. In the end, Hamilton went longer than we predicted, stopping on laps 14 and 33.
