PACE DEBRIEF: Hamilton delivers remarkable pace in Shanghai Sprint
Following an action-packed Satuday at the Shanghai International Circuit, F1Technical's senior writer Balazs Szabo analyses teams' and drivers performance in the F1 Shanghai Sprint.
Having secured his first pole position with Ferrari in yesterday's sprint qualifying, seven-time F1 world champion Lewis Hamilton took a dominant victory with the Scuderia in the Shanghai F1 Sprint at the Chinese Grand Prix.
McLaren's Oscar Piastri came home second ahead of Max Verstappen, while George Russell finished fourth, from Charles Leclerc in P5, Yuki Tsunoda in P6, Kimi Antonelli in P7, with Lando Norris securing the last point in the Shanghai F1 Sprint.
The seven-time F1 champion produced an average lap time of 96.85s in the 100km dash which was almost three tenth quicker than what second-placed Piastri managed.
The British driver generated a narrow box plot as he lost significantly less than his rivals through the stint on a day when front graining and tyre management were the main topic.
Hamilton posted the quickest lap of the sprint race on Lap 2 with a time of 1m35.399s while his last lap time was a 1m37.132s which led to a loss of 1.7s across the stint. By contrast, Piastri lost 1.8s, Russell 2.6s and Verstappen 2.6s over the entire stint due to the high degradation on the front tyres.
Looking at the length of the box plots, the two Ferrari drivers stand out, with Hamilton and Leclerc having generated a narrow section, albeit the Monegasque was 0.47s per lap slower than his new team-mate as he struggled for pace in the opening stages of the sprint race.
By contrast, both Piastri and Russell had a longer box plot due to their tyre issues in the dying moment of the race. Verstappen generated the longest box plot as he deliberately elected to go with Hamilton in the opening stages of the race which prompted him to dictate high pace in the opening segment, but he massively struggled as the stint developed.
Speaking of the tyre issues, Verstappen said: "Our tyre degradation [in the sprint] was better [than FP1] but still not good enough and, if you're talking about a full race distance, that means you're dropping back quite far.
"It's not like I can take it easier either, because then you'll get overtaken as well. We changed a few things into qualifying, but I don't think it's going to change a whole lot. I think our deficit is bigger than it was last year," the Dutchman concluded.
