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Welcome to Shanghai, China for the 3rd race of the 2013 Formula 1 season. Coming into this race, Red Bull were the most talked about team, for obvious reasons. The team has said that it’s sorted out, Seb has apologized, but that will not change things between him and Mark, at least for the next few races. Going into this race, there is a lot to look forward to, like the pace of Mercedes and Lotus, and if Ferrari can continue to be strong.
Practice
Friday Practice did not really show us a clear picture of who is the fastest. Mercedes were fastest in the morning and Massa in his Ferrari went quickest in the afternoon. Even on Saturday morning we still had no clear picture, as this time it was Alonso who topped the time sheets with Mercedes and Red Bull looking quick.
Qualifying
They call it the best hour of racing! Q1 saw the usual suspects falling out, with the only surprise being Gutierrez’s Sauber not making it into Q2. Q2 was filled with surprises. Webber’s Red Bull was not sufficiently fueled and he was asked to stop on track. He qualified 14th but because of not providing 1 litre sample to the FIA stewards, he was disqualified and had to start from the back of the pack. It was the same issue that Red Bull faced at last year’s Abu Dhabi GP. Red Bull suddenly did not look as quick as we expected them to be. Q3 started and Vettel decided not to set a lap time. Hamilton set the track on fire, setting the fastest lap time in the process. It was the first pole for Mercedes after Sir Sterling Moss in the 1955 British GP. Kimi was 2nd and Alonso came in 3rd. This was the second time that neither Red Bull started on the front row in 65 GPs
Race
With Hamilton on pole amd Raikkonen behind him, the bulls were nowhere to be seen. Webber was forced to start from the pits, so could we expect him to do what Vettel did in Abu Dhabi last year?
As the 5 red lights went off, Hamilton had a clean start whereas Kimi fell back behind the two Ferraris before turn 1. All 22 cars got through without any incident. Webber came out and quickly passed the back markers before his team decided to pit him at the end of lap 1 to get the soft tires out of the way. That is a very different strategy but there is no harm in that, considering he started from the pits.
With the DRS enabled, the Ferraris were catching up to Hamilton and at the end of lap 4, both Alonso and Massa got past Lewis on the main straight. Lewis complained of understeer in his car. The two Force Indias’ almost took each other out before the final turn and gave us some wheel to wheel action.
As expected, the softs didn’t last very long and teams were already making pitstops. Both the Mercedes cars were the first ones to come in, followed by Alonso, Raikkonen, Massa and the rest.
After lap 8, those who started on the mediums, Vettel, Hulkenburg, Di Resta, Button, Perez, Vergne and Bottas, stayed out and made the most of the pit stops and all of them were in the top 10, with Hulkenburg leading from Vettel and Button.
With the tires at the right temperatures, the top 4 starters started catching up the non stoppers whose tires were falling off the pace. On Lap 14, Hulkenburg and Vettel pit for a fresh set of mediums. Vergne and Webber collided and that damaged Webber’s front wing, who pit later that lap. Vergne spun and continued without any issues. Webber’s race went from bad to worse when he had issues with his right rear tyre and ended up stopping on track because the wheel came off!
There was action up and down the field with Raikkonen almost taking out Perez, but both continued with only minor damage to the Lotus’s nose.
After 20 laps, the only non stoppers were the two Mclarens. The updates seem to have worked, at least in terms of managing the tires. Rosberg came in for the 4th time and this time decided to retire his car due to a mechanical issue. Not a good welcome back to China for him.
With half the race done, the running order was Vettel, Alonso, Hulkenburg, Button (who finally pit), Hamilton and Raikkonen. No one had any idea on who could win this race as things looked very close, although Alonso had the best chance of winning.
Alonso got past Vettel and both Hamilton and Raikkonen got past Button. Vettel pit for another set of mediums and chose to hold off the softs until his last stint. With another set of pit stops yet to be done, it was Alonso leading from Hamilton and Raikkonen. Vettel got past 3 cars on his fresh set of tires.
Hamilton and Raikkonen pit for the the final time for mediums. Now it was a case of managing their tires and holding off Vettel and Button from taking their podium places. With a fresher set of tires, Hamilton was catching Kimi. Alonso was comfortably cruising in the front, leading by almost 20 seconds, and eventually did his last pit stop on lap 40, coming out right behind Vettel, who still had to stop for softs. Alonso didn’t wait long to regain the lead and got past Vettel into turn 1 on the very next lap.
At the back of the grid, it was the two Maurissas who were again ahead of the two Caterhams, with Bianchi leading that pack as expected. At the front, Button gave a tough time to Hamilton and didn’t let him pass that easily.
On Lap 50, Button pit for softs and fell back to 7th. But he took advantage of the additional grip and quickly got past Massa for 6th. A lap later, Vettel came in for softs and because of the quick pit stop, he could come out in 4th, ahead of Di Resta. And this was a very good idea. Vettel was fast, very fast indeed, and he caught up to Hamilton very quickly. On the last lap, he was just a second behind him. It looked like Vettel was going to take the last podium position, but he went too late on the brakes and that cost him.
Meanwhile Alonso took his 31st win, a win after 13 starts. Kimi had a great race barring his start and took the flag after Alonso, and was followed by Hamilton and Vettel, with Button taking 5th.
So, all in all, a good race for everybody except for the non finishers, Webber, Sutil, Gutierrez and Rosberg.
Bianchi again proved to us that the Marussia is faster than the Caterham and he is the best of the Rookies in a back marker. Mercedes have proved to us that they can be quick and have good race pac,e and just need that little bit more to win a race.
Ricciardo had a great race, finishing in 7th in front of Di Resta in the lone Force India. Massa’s performance drastically reduced over the race. He was in 2nd after the first lap and the race didn’t go well for him after that. Ferrari will have to look into what went wrong and improve to make sure that both cars finish well and fight for the Championship.
After the race, Webber was handed a three place grid penalty for his collision with Vergne whereas Gutierrez was handed a 5 place grid penalty for his collision with Sutil.
Results:
As far as the championship is concerned, it’s Vettel leading Raikkonen and Alonso. The three are just covered by 9 points and as for the Constructors, it’s Red Bull leading Ferrari by just 5 points.
Bahrain next weekend would be the last race before the European leg starts. Teams will want to finish this part of the season on a high before heading for the races across Europe. Let’s see how the next race turns out.
