Rosberg stays out of trouble to easily win Chinese GP

F1 Grand Prix, GP China, Shanghai International Ciruit

Nico Rosberg has dominantly won the Chinese Grand Prix, basically by staying out of the first laps trouble that eliminated his closest contenders. Sebastian Vettel recovered to second place after a first lap incident while Daniil Kvyat completed the podium in third place.

The Chinese Grand Prix got underway under sunny skies, with temperatures similar to those on Friday when Ferrari were impressively quick on the super soft tyres. At the start, the entire top 10 were on the super soft, except for Rosberg. Massa in 11th and Alonso in 12th were starting on brand new soft tyres, followed by Button and Hulkenberg who chose to to start on the super softs.

As the lights went out, Vettel immediately incurred damage through turn 1, judging Kvyat was 'coming in like a madman' and he could not avoid contact. The German fell back to 8th but opted to continue, contrary to Raikkonen aand Hamilton who both pitted for new front wings at the end of the first lap. Replays later showed however that it was Vettel who ran into Raikkonen while Kvyat was passing both Ferrari's by taking the inside line through the long turn 1.

At the front, Ricciardo had the best start and jumped to the front, leading the race to Rosberg at the end of the first lap. Kvyat followed in third, with behind Perez, Hulkenberg and Sainz.

On lap 3, Ricciardo's fairytale came to an early end already as his left rear tyre punctured on the back straight, requiring him to pits. He rejoined in 18th position, ahead of Raikkonen and Hamilton. A safety car was subsequently brought out on the track to clear debris, triggering numerous pitstops, including one for a nose change on Vettel's car.

During that safety car, it was interesting to see how slowly cars went into the pits, backing up each other as they would have had to wait for their teammates to complete their stops anyway. Vettel though had none of that, passing two cars on the pit entry.

Mercedes meanwhile pitted Hamilton one lap after his first stop, changing to soft tyres to get the mandatory two compound running out of the way.

Behind the SC, positions were Rosberg, Massa, Alonso, Wehrlein, Gutierrez, Kvyat, Palmer, Haryanto, Perez and Bottas. Button in 11th was the first runner not on the soft tyres, having opted for mediums during his early stop. Vettel was 15th, Raikkonen 19th and Hamilton 21st.

As the SC left on lap 9, a period of tense racing followed, with Vettel quickly progressing on his new super softs.

By lap 13, Kvyat had moved up to second, Vettel into 6th, Ricciardo to 12th and Hamilton to 13th. Raikkonen got himself passed by Hamilton and was 15th.

On lap 15, as Kvyat passed Massa for second, Vettel get ahead of Alonso and once again lost a piece of front wing during that move for fourth place. Perez soon followed suit to pass the Spaniard, even though it was interesting to see that he failed to make the move stick on the back straight, signalling the improvement that Honda have made on their power unit.

On lap 17, Alonso pitted and changed to medium tyres, rejoining the race in 18th, ahead of Raikkonen who had also switched to mediums a few laps earlier.

Meanwhile, ahead of all the action, Rosberg pitted to change for new softs and returned to the track still in the lead.

At around lap 23, the racing settled down a bit, and most action was created by both McLaren Honda's being quite a bit slower than their direct competition due to running on the medium tyres.

By lap 40, following countless pitstops with nearly everyone on different strategies, the top 10 were all running on medium tyres, apart from both Ferrari's as they were using sets of soft tyres.

As Rosberg continued to lead dominantly, Vettel comforted himself with second place, having made his way past Kvyat. Massa ran in fourth, fighting off challenges from Hamilton and Ricciardo who were both eyeing a position improvement. It turned out to be a magnificent battle among three, with Ricciardo taking Hamilton as the latter failed for numerous laps to mount a serious challenge to the Williams driver. Two laps later, Hamitlon was already up into 4th, leaving Massa and Hamilton behnd.

In 7th was the other Williams of Bottas, and he too was fighting off a challenge. Raikkonen needed a handful of laps but eventually got past to move up into 7th himself. Ninth was Perez, 10th Sainz with his team mate Verstappen in 11th place.

By lap 45, Raikkonen caught up with Massa and Hamilton and just like Ricciardo, worked his way past Hamilton before he could make a move stick on Massa ahead. Another lap later, Raikkonen moved up into 5th, making perfect use of soft tyres versus older mediums for Massa and Hamilton.

Late into the race, Verstappen was the only man able to make some progress still, first making it past his team mate thanks to very new soft tyres, and later on around Bottas who was found struggling on worn medium tyres.

As such, Rosberg won an easy race for him, leading from lap three until the end of the race. Vettel finished second, ahead of Kvyat who completed the podium. Hamilton did get some points at least, but was basically on the back foot since Friday due to a gearbox induced grid-penalty and technical trouble in qualifying.