F1 2025 Chinese Grand Prix Review (Undercutters Ep13 transcript)
As ever, you can find me on Twitter or Blue Sky under the name MorrisF1, or at morrisf1.blogspot.com, which is where I post episode transcripts and graphics such as standings and suchlike.
The Chinese Grand Prix weekend also saw our first sprint race of the year.
Chinese Sprint 00m 44s
Qualifying for the Chinese sprint was pretty interesting. In the first session Lawson was slowest, and Hulkenberg exited while Bortoleto reached the second session. Both Alpines were out in SQ1, with Doohan faster than Gasly, while Ocon also left at this stage, meaning Bearman outqualified him.In SQ2 we waved goodbye to Alonso, Bearman, Sainz, Bortoleto, and Hadjar, the latter two screwing up their laps. In addition, this means Stroll continued his good start to the season, outqualifying Alonso, and Albon beat Sainz again.
In the final session of sprint qualifying the McLarens had the pace for the front row but carrying extra fuel for an initial run then failing to improve later on meant the best Piastri could do was 3rd. Ahead of him, Hamilton was fastest of them all, narrowly ahead of Verstappen. The top three were separated by less than a tenth of a second. Leclerc and Russell were behind Piastri and only then came Norris, with a surprisingly weak 6th. Antonelli got 7th but was six-tenths off Russell, and right behind him were Tsunoda, Albon, and Stroll.
This set up the grid rather nicely for the sprint race.
It was used medium tyres throughout the field for the sprint, with Hulkenberg making a pit lane start due to a setup change. The sprint is just 19 laps, roughly a third of the 56 of the Grand Prix.
It was mostly formation flying at the start but Ocon tumbled down the order and Antonelli fell down to 8th. Norris made a mistake and went down to 9th. Even on the first lap, Hamilton and Verstappen were close and both pulled of them away from Piastri. This led to initial pressure by Leclerc on Piastri, but the Aussie retained his position. Not only that, Russell was able to snatch 4th from Leclerc at the end of the long straight on lap 1.
This was handy for Piastri as there was now a much larger gap behind him, while Leclerc and Russell continued to squabble.
On lap 2, Hamilton did very well to just barely escape DRS range and deny Verstappen that advantage on the straight. The same thing happened on the subsequent lap, the Briton doing great work to keep his old rival behind him. Meanwhile, Norris was still back in 9th, and couldn’t pass Stroll despite having DRS.
Only a few laps later many cars in the top half were out of DRS range, with the lower half of the grid largely still bunched up and able to use it. One exception was Antonelli in 7th being close to Tsunoda in 6th. The gap between Hamilton and Verstappen had increased and Piastri got within DRS of Verstappen. Even with the DRS, Piastri was only able to close the gap over the two straights rather than effect a pass immediately.
Norris and Russell were both having tyre graining on the front left, something that would affect other drivers as the sprint continued.
On lap 8 both Verstappen and Piastri had DRS over the line, but Hamilton was still able to fend them off and keep the lead. The top three continued to pull away from Russell in 4th.
On lap 11, Norris was struggling with his tyres, while further down the field Hadjar got ahead of Sainz, as did Lawson.
The next lap saw Sainz pit, which is a rarity in a sprint but he apparently suffered damage, and when he emerged he was 20s behind Hulkenberg, who was 19th.
There was a high rate of tyre wear which meant a lot of conservation, so there was, after the first lap, less overtaking than might have been the case.
Three-quarters into the sprint there was a close top three, though Hamilton was edging away, with a gap of 5s to Russell and Leclerc. Behind this pair was a 5s gap to Tsunoda, Antonelli, Stroll, and Norris, who had closed up.
Lap 15 also saw a slightly surprising pass by Piastri on Verstappen into the hairpin between the straights. Typically he hadn’t gotten close enough to try it there previously, instead focusing on the first corner. This gave Verstappen the DRS on the starting straight, but he was unable to retake the place.
Antonelli was still trying to make headway against Tsunoda, but the Japanese driver defended ably to retain his 6th position.
Once Piastri had passed Verstappen he eased away and never seemed under threat, but at the same time Hamilton was extending his lead, cementing the top three in place over the last few laps. Hamilton claimed the win, with Piastri 2nd, and Verstappen in 3rd.
Towards the end, Verstappen was falling closer to Russell and Leclerc but he had enough of a gap that he was never under threat. Russell ended up 4th and Leclerc 5th. Tsunoda successfully kept Antonelli behind him, with good defending from the Japanese driver who claimed 6th, while the rookie had to make do with 7th. But we saw from Piastri and Norris that overtaking was not straightforward despite the straights.
On the penultimate lap, Norris finally passed Stroll to get himself into 8th for the final point in the sprint race. But it’s a weak start to the Chinese race weekend for the driver who was so assured in Australia.
Stroll and Alonso ended up 9th and 10th, but with the Canadian 14s ahead of the Spaniard.
Chinese Grand Prix Qualifying 6m 28s
Qualifying for the race proper was another shocker for Lawson, who ended up slowest of them all in Q1. Also eliminated were Gasly, Bearman, Doohan, and Bortoleto, but all four of those can be expected to leave the stage early in qualifying due to car performance. Lawson’s Red Bull has far more pace but he has two problems. It seems to have a very narrow window of working well, and Verstappen can find that while Lawson cannot. In addition, the gaps between the field now are very small, so if you’re a little bit slower that can make a big difference. Even if Lawson were driving well he’d likely be a few tenths off Verstappen. Because he isn’t, the gap gets larger and this creates a huge difference in the grid slots of the two drivers.Q2 was another tight session, in which we said goodbye to Ocon, Hulkenberg, Alonso, Stroll, and Sainz. While Albon again beat Sainz, the Thai driver did have to burn through his last soft tyre set, effectively putting him in 10th. Sainz still needs to find a little speed in his Williams. Fairly good results for Ocon and Hulkenberg to reach 11th and 12th given their team mates were both out in Q1.
In qualifying up to this point the Ferrari pace seemed to have mysteriously vanished, while the McLarens appeared to have the edge. As ever, Verstappen loomed as a threat for pole.
It looked like it was going to be a McLaren front row with Piastri securing his first pole ahead of Norris in 2nd. However, at the last gasp, Russell put in an astonishingly good lap to split the McLarens and put himself up into 2nd which pushed Norris down into 3rd. Verstappen could only manage 4th but is right behind Norris. The third row is Ferrari territory with Hamilton ahead of Leclerc.
It was a fantastic qualifying session for Racing Bulls, with Hadjar putting himself up into 7th and Tsunoda qualifying 9th. Between the pair is Antonelli, and behind them is Albon.
This is a pretty substantial shift from the grid for the sprint, and set up the race really rather nicely.
Chinese Grand Prix Race Review 8m 59s
Lawson opted to start from the pit lane for the Chinese Grand Prix, having made some setup changes to try and improve his performance. Almost the whole grid started on medium tyres, with Stroll, Bearman, and Lawson on the hard tyre.
Off the line Russell initially had a better getaway than Piastri but Norris had an even better start and passed Russell to claim 2nd place. Verstappen had an unusually poor start, losing out to both Ferraris. Hamilton stayed ahead of Leclerc but there was minor contact that knocked off one of Leclerc’s front wing end plates. Surprisingly, this didn’t really appear to affect his pace. Further back, Tsunoda had a good start, passing Antonelli and Hadjar, while Hadjar was passed by not only Tsunoda but also Antonelli.
At the first round of pit stops Norris lost out to Russell as the Mercedes undercut to take the place. For those new to F1, undercutting is when you pit a lap early and use the better grip of fresh tyres to go faster and make up time so that when a driver who had been ahead of you pits you end up in front of them. However, Norris was very close and fast enough to reclaim the place without too much difficulty.
Incidentally, Lawson’s initial stint on hard tyres did not last as long as expected. Poor tyre wear plus lack of pace is making this a nightmare start to Lawson’s first season with Red Bull. Unlike him, Stroll and Bearman stayed out on their hard tyres.
These two chaps, looking for a one stop, were very close, with Bearman right behind Stroll. He did manage to pass but locked up his tyres and shortly afterwards had to pit, perhaps earlier than planned.
It was more bad luck for Fernando Alonso. He had gravel and a wet track conspiring to take him out in Australia, and at the Shanghai International Circuit his rear brakes failed and he had to box and retire. Rough start to the year for Alonso.
The Ferraris seemed out of the fight for the podium but were comfortably ahead of Verstappen. Despite Leclerc damaging his front wing he looked the faster driver and Hamilton swapped places with him. Leclerc set off pursuing Russell and soon dropped Hamilton. Although the Monegasque got close to Russell he was not able to get past him.
Meanwhile, Piastri had been comfortably holding onto the lead and had built up a 4s gap over Norris. However, the Briton started reducing this. It seemed to be to avoid the risk of undercut from Russell behind, but things played out differently. Contrary to the received wisdom of a two stop race being better, almost everyone went for a one-stop. This might have been a switch in strategy as Piastri and others felt more comfortable in the race with tyre wear, perhaps due to successful setup changes following a very rough sprint that saw tyres go off pretty quickly.
Stroll got all the way to lap 37 before he pitted and swapped hard tyres for the medium. Around this time Verstappen’s Red Bull finally discovered some pace and he started closing up rapidly on Hamilton.
The top 6 were pretty close at this point but behind them was a hefty 21s gap to Ocon and Antonelli. The Haas was having a way better race than last weekend, aided by good driving and the right one stop strategy.
Hamilton pitted, becoming the first, and only, top 6 runner to make two stops, taking advantage of the big gap behind. He was looking highly at risk of losing out to Verstappen so putting on fresh tyres was a decent idea. Unfortunately after a few laps of banging in fast times it became clear he didn’t have the speed to close the gap unless others boxed and nobody ahead of him did.
This was also the approach taken by those behind Hamilton. In addition to him, only the two Racing Bulls, down in 15th and 16th, Lawson in 17th, and Bortoleto in 19th had made two pit stops, as of lap 42. Lawson had bad pace throughout, and the Sauber was sadly living up to its testing form of being slow as a narcoleptic tortoise. However, the Racing Bulls were a bit better and might have had a shot at points but were undone by their two stop strategy. I think they’ll be scoring plenty more points in the next few races.
Tsunoda had more misfortune, with front wing damage forcing him into the pits again. After the terrible strategy call that robbed him of a strong finish in Australia, the Japanese driver must hope he’s getting all the bad luck for this season out of the way early. He could’ve easily scored in both races, but ended up scoring in neither.
With only half a dozen or so laps left Verstappen started closing up on Leclerc and soon got within DRS range. The two had an entertaining tussle into the first few corners and Verstappen emerged ahead. Leclerc tried to fight back but Verstappen managed to fend him off. The Red Bull was clearly not great this weekend, but it was a decent damage limitation exercise by Verstappen.
At the same time, Norris got a warning about his brakes. This proved critical on the final lap, when a 5s advantage over Russell was cut to just 1.3s as Norris desperately tried to keep his brakes just barely alive. Very solid job by him, though. But the day was, rightly, Piastri’s. He never looked under serious threat, having claimed pole, retained the lead off the line and being assured throughout. Even if McLaren stay top dog all season, we could still have a great fight for the F1 2025 title. That being said, while fastest, the McLarens didn’t build up a ridiculous gap over the rest of the top 6 so I do think we’ll see other winners. It’s also worth mentioning Norris had a few errors this weekend, in contrast to the Australian Grand Prix where he was practically perfect. This was handy for Piastri and allowed him to close the gap in both the sprint and Grand Prix. If Norris had failed to keep his brakes going this could’ve been an even bigger turn around, but the Briton did well to keep hold of 2nd.
Russell’s been doing a good job this season. He was on the podium last weekend, and achieved the same this time out. If McLaren screw up an update or Mercedes do a good job, he could yet feature in the title fight.
Behind Russell was Verstappen, then Leclerc and Hamilton. At least, initially. Shortly after the race both Ferraris and Gasly were disqualified. Hamilton was disqualified due to a skid block breach whereas Leclerc and Gasly both fell foul of car weight regulations. Needless to say, this is terrible for Ferrari who lost a double points finish, and not great for Gasly either. He had been 11th and would’ve been promoted into the points had it not been for this penalty.
Ferrari had a very mixed weekend, with a surprisingly good sprint but then a setup change after that compromising pace for both qualifying and the race before suffering a double disqualification. Verstappen’s doing a good job with a car that looks the fourth fastest right now, but unless something changes I think this is the year the title slips out of his hands.
The happiest chaps, barring Piastri, on the grid must be Haas. They looked abysmal in Australia but their single stop strategy and race pace meant that Ocon finished all the way up in 7th, ahead of Antonelli. Then the double disqualification of Ferrari promoted him into 5th. Bearman was also in the points, finishing in 10th and then getting promoted into 8th thanks to Ferrari’s woe. Very good result for the team, perhaps slightly aided by Antonelli getting stuck behind Tsunoda in his initial stint, without which he might have been further up the road. Bearman was also the top finisher from the three who started on the hard tyre, the others being Lawson and Stroll.
Antonelli’s 6th is not ideal, but it’s not a disaster either. Something of a weak result, he was 42s behind Russell. Not the end of the world, but he does need to sharpen up a bit. The start may have been the race for him, as getting stuck behind Tsunoda was not just a problem for race pace but also tyre wear.
Albon got himself into 9th, which then became 7th, scoring points for the second weekend running. The Williams didn’t seem to like this track quite as much as Albert Park, but Albon both outqualified and outraced Sainz again, which is no mean feat. The Spaniard’s a very good driver but it seems he needs a little time to get to grips with the Williams. However, thanks to the three disqualifications Sainz got promoted all the way into 10th, nabbing the final point. It was also a handy shift for Stroll, who became 9th after the disqualifications, and means he has scored points in both the Grands Prix this season.
After them we had Hadjar, Lawson, Doohan, Bortoleto, Hulkenberg, and Tsunoda. Alonso was the only retirement from the Chinese Grand Prix.
Doohan had a 10s time penalty for forcing Hadjar off the track while defending.
One thing to mention is the dog that didn’t bark. There was no safety car. There’s a high chance of one appearing in China, and this means teams underfuel their cars because there’s less consumption when following the safety car and going a lot slower than race pace. This meant that pretty much everyone had to save fuel by lifting and coasting into corners.
Highlights and Lowlights 19m 43s
The Sauber living up to its testing reputation of being atrocious was not great to see. Bortoleto seems promising and Hulkenberg’s a good driver, but after outscoring Ferrari in the Australian Grand Prix it seems they might, in the dry, be as poor as feared. Time will tell whether this was a one-off or if they can develop throughout the season.
Haas moved in the exact opposite direction, with a double points result, and ending up as best of the rest. Excellent news for them, but the question for them and Sauber is whether Australia or China was the weird result, and which one is a better indicator of the season to come. Unfortunately for Sauber, the fact China was a dry race means it’s probably a better form guide for F1 2025.
At the sharp end, McLaren were fast but they weren’t crushingly dominant. Other teams are within touching distance. The great driver lineup does make it seem the papaya team are likeliest to win the Constructors’, but the two men will take points off each in the races, so the Drivers’ title remains open even if nobody catches them.
Alpine are the only team not to score so far. I’m pretty surprised by this. It might not be time to panic for Alpine fans as Australia was very wet and Gasly did finish 11th at both races, pre-disqualification, so they aren’t a million miles away. But the midfield battle last season was fierce and this year is going to be much the same, so they need to turn things around soon.
Speaking of which, Racing Bulls have conspired to make themselves the second lowest scoring team, with only sprint points for Tsunoda so far. Mostly, this is bad strategy. On pace, they’re looking pretty good. But the two stop (three for Tsunoda due to damage) in China and terrible strategic timing in Australia ruined any hope of scoring.
For Ferrari, they followed up a great sprint with a mediocre Grand Prix that then saw them both disqualified for different technical infringements. This is rare but does happen, and it’s a bit rough on the drivers.
Chinese Grand Prix Predictions Assessment 22m 03s
I managed to get almost all my predictions wrong, although a lot of them were very close. But wrong’s wrong, whether it’s by an inch or a mile. I had Piastri as the sprint winner, and he was 2nd in that event, losing out to Hamilton.
I had Norris down for pole and he ended up 3rd. And for the podium I had it as Norris, Piastri, and Verstappen, each one of whom was one place off finishing where I said, which is a little bit unlucky.
When it comes to midfield points I had Alonso, who retired with a brake failure and was the only man to DNF, and Albon, who scored in 7th. So that was the thing I got right. My extra prediction of a large gap, over 25s, from 1st to 3rd, was also completely wrong.
In my defence, there were a lot of near misses, but getting a single prediction right is a bit rubbish.
F1 2025 Standings after the Chinese Grand Prix 23m 09s
So, how do things stand after the 2025 Chinese Grand Prix?
Norris retained his lead and slightly extended it over Verstappen, with 44 points to Verstappen’s 36. However, we also have Russell on 35 and Piastri on 34, with the Aussie having a near perfect weekend to drastically reduce his deficit to Norris. That’s perhaps the worst news for Norris, who had a poor sprint and a decent race. On the plus side, with failing brakes there had been a chance the title leader might have failed to score anything in the Chinese Grand Prix.
I think Piastri is an obvious rival for Norris, and Russell’s also driving well enough to be a contender if the Mercedes gets the slightest advantage. Verstappen is driving incredibly well but he is not being helped by the Red Bull one bit.
Further back there’s Antonelli on 22 and Albon on 16 points. Ocon and Stroll both stand on 10 points, with Hamilton and Leclerc on just 9 and 8 respectively after their disqualification from the Chinese Grand Prix.
Hulkenberg is on 6 points, Bearman on 4, while Tsunoda has 3 and Sainz has 1 point.
Half a dozen drivers have yet to score, and these are: Gasly, Hadjar, Lawson, Doohan, Bortoleto, and, most surprisingly, Alonso.
I probably won’t go through the entire list for every race review, but I wanted to have a quick run down after the first couple of races.
McLaren are on 78 points, ahead of Mercedes on 57. Antonelli’s had a good start as a rookie but he needs to rapidly improve if Mercedes want to challenge McLaren, who are looking a good prospect to retain their Constructors’ title. Red Bull have 36, which is not bad for a one-driver team.
Williams and Ferrari are both on 17 points. Fair to say it’s not been an ideal start for Ferrari, while Albon’s had a great couple of opening races. Haas are on 14 points, with Aston Martin on 10. Sauber have 6 points, while Racing Bulls have 3 points and Alpine none at all. I fully expect Alpine to score and for Racing Bulls to do better when the strategy team lets Tsunoda finish a Grand Prix in the top 10. I think Sauber will drift backwards, but when it’s wet then Hulkenberg has a shot at winning good points.
F1 News 25m 53s
F1 news.
There was some sad news just before the Chinese Grand Prix weekend, namely the death of Eddie Jordan. He was 76 years old, and died of cancer. Jordan had an eponymous F1 team, which began in 1991 and was sold in 2005. During this decade and a half they won four Grands Prix. Later, Jordan became a pundit for TV coverage of the sport. An exuberant character, Jordan had world champions drive for him, most famously giving Michael Schumacher his first race seat, while Damon Hill won the team’s first race in 1998. Jordan remained active in the sport, and was the man who brokered the deal between Adrian Newey and Aston Martin.
There is other, more run-of-the-mill, news too. Also before the Chinese Grand Prix, but after I recorded the previous episode, the FIA announced more stringent tests on rear wings. While McLaren isn’t the only team doing this, the new measure, believed to be prompted by Red Bull complaining, is pretty much aimed at trying to slow down McLaren by reducing rear wing flexing, the so-called mini-DRS. This is nothing new. For a technologically advanced sport, F1 teams would far rather complain about an innovation than try to emulate it, and are happy nagging for rules to be tightened to punish other teams for coming up with impressive ideas.
Why does this matter? Because it alters the downforce level at the rear, reducing it on a straight for a faster top speed and then changing shape for more downforce in corners, offering better grip. The permitted amount of flexing at the rear has now been reduced significantly, and will be cut even more for Japan. In Australia, the slot gap had been allowed at 2mm, while the China figure is 0.75mm, and in Japan this will be reduced to 0.5mm. Will this have a dramatic impact?
I would say no. It might alter things slightly, but the advantage, or one of them, McLaren appears to have is looking after their tyres very well so unless this compromises that then a small loss of pace is unlikely to cause serious problems. Also, Ferrari may be doing the same thing.
Generally, I’m not a fan of changing things mid-season, but this is far from the first time teams have complained to get innovations banned or altered. We’ve seen this from Brawn’s double diffuser to the FRIC suspension and F-duct of Mercedes, and now the mini-DRS and flexi-wings. I think it’d be a lot better to just let engineers be creative and reward them for coming up with clever ideas that work well, instead of hitting them with a ban hammer for the sin of original thinking and coming up with good ideas.
And that brings us to the end of this episode. If you’ve enjoyed this episode please remember to leave a positive rating and review. Thank you for listening. Next Tuesday will be the preview for the Japanese Grand Prix, which is the first race in a triple header.
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