Nico Rosberg won today's Chinese Grand Prix. The german driver lost first place temporarily to Red Bull's Daniel Ricciardo, who started from the second grid place, but the australian driver suffered a puncture minutes later, and he was forced to do an early pitstop. Ferrari had a close to disastrous start to their race. In an attempt to avoid contact with Kvyat in the first corner, Vettel went out too wide and hit team mate Räikkönen, and the two dropped several places down the grid. Vettel blamed Kvyat for the incident, stating that he drove like "a suicidal", but the incident was referred to as a racing incident and nobody was penalized. Neither Ferrari recieved any significant damage, but Räikkönen were forced into the pits to change the nose of his car and came out last. Grosjean and Hamilton had equally bad starts to their race, when Grosjean hit the back of Ericsson's Sauber and Hamilton hit the back of Nasr's Sauber. Grosjean's front recieved minimal damage form the hit, but Hamilton lost his front wing, and he had to limp into the pits for a new front wing and new tyres. The multiple incidents triggered a safety car, but fortunately none of the drivers involved in the incidents had to retire.

Rosberg had a very relaxing and stable race in China. After Ricciardo lost the lead due to a puncture, Rosberg lead the race unchallenged. Ferrari's Vettel was nearly 38 seconds behind him when Rosberg crossed the line and took a third consecutive win. Meanwhile, team mate Hamilton struggled with the car from start to finish. The front wing he lost in the incident with Nasr was stuck under his car for a long duration, and Mercedes suspected that the wing had damaged components under the car. He struggles particularly much on the medium tyres he raced with in the end, and he could hardly mount a challenge against William's Massa. Hamilton finished in 7th place.

After the incident in the first corner, both Ferraris managed to get up into second place, but by then Rosberg was out of reach for him. Räikkönen, who dropped down all the way to the back of the grid, managed to get up into 5th.

Ricciardo managed to climb up to 4th place in the end. His team mate Kvyat had a good start and a stable race, even if he couldnt fight off Vettel. He finished third, and scored Red Bull's first podium this season. Red Bull definitely looked stronger than several other teams today, and so they could very well be the best of the rest as of present.

Williams struggled to stay ahead of Red Bull and Toro Rosso, with Ricciardo easily overtaking Massa and Bottas being overtaken by both Toro Rosso drivers. Massa could however keep Hamilton behind him, and thus he finished 6th today, while Bottas grabbed one single point in 10th place.

Both McLaren drivers fought valiantly in a number of squabbles, but the McLaren car suffer on tracks such as this one with long straights, and the pair ended up in 12th (Alonso) and 13th (Button) respectively.

Force India were within reach for a points finish, but Hulkenberg recieved a five second penalty for driving with unnecessarily low speed in the pits, and Perez was under investigation for an unsafe release. Perez finished 11th, while Hulkenberg slipped down into 15th.

Haas were significantly less competitive this race. After the incident with Ericsson, Grosjean slipped back into the back of the grid, and could only climb up to 19th place. He was very discontent with the car this weekend, and went so far as to tell the team to retire him. Team mate Gutierrez could only manage a 14th place today, quite a distance behind the two McLarens.

Sauber and Renault both had an equally uncompetitive race, with Ericsson in 16th place, Magnussen 17th, Nasr in 20th, and Renault's Palmer all the way down in 22th place, behind Manor driver Haryanto. Haryanto's team mate Wehrlein managed to climb into 18th place.

Barron

Posts: 625

Less of the invective mate. Not necessary..

• -1
• Apr 18 2016 - 13:48

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