What to Expect at the Chinese Grand Prix

After a gap of five years, Formula 1 returns to China this weekend for round five of this year’s World Championship, which takes place at the Shanghai International Circuit. The venue hosted its first F1 race 20 years ago and from the air, the circuit was designed to resemble the Chinese symbol for ‘shang’ which translates as ‘upon.’

The return of Formula 1 to Shanghai also marks the first of six Sprint weekends this year (with the second taking place in Miami in a fortnight). This year there has been a tweak to the timetable, so Sprint Qualifying takes place on Friday afternoon, the shorter-distance 100km Sprint race is at 12 noon (local time) while traditional Qualifying for the Grand Prix remains in its usual Saturday afternoon slot.

With reports that the Shanghai International Circuit has been resurfaced, it means the pressure is on the teams and drivers to get to grips with their setups in just the one hour free practice session on Friday morning. One of the key tasks for the engineers is the sequence of right-handers at the start and end of the lap that place an extra demand on tyre wear, particularly the left-front — making car setup a challenge. It’s set to be a frantic weekend and the lack of track time will increase the jeopardy across the field.

Max Verstappen has won three of the first four events held so far this year and will once again be favourite heading to China this weekend. His team-mate Sergio Perez was much closer to the world champion last time out in Japan and will be looking to take that top spot.

Finally, we can expect a bumper crowd this weekend as history will be made when Stake F1 Team’s Zhou Guanyu becomes the first Chinese driver to line-up on the grid at his home race.