Round 3: China 2016: Preview

Greetings Internet, 

It is that time of week again where I - an unimportant peasant of the internet pollute your screens, or at least a small portion of it as you scroll past to find something more amusing... likely involving cats. But for those brave (or just lost) souls who have ended up on this page, intentionally or otherwise I welcome thee to the opening post for the third round of the championship. A championship which has seen more fighting off the track and in meeting rooms than it has on the racing surface which in turn has seen quite a bit of entertainment to begin with. At least one of the major arguments has finally been put to bed in the form of qualifying - where after weeks of of 'discussions' and meetings where increasingly mad suggestions started to bubble to the surface some common sense appears to have prevailed. Alas as one argument peters out, there are plenty more waiting in the wings to take to the stage and although we might be safe from more qualifying changes for a while - bigger plans may be afoot for 2017. Hopefully that will also be set aside for at least one race this weekend China - although we might not actually have much of a race given some mid-week developments.

 The News

The first point of order naturally is the row over qualifying. After it failed in Melbourne there was a meeting - that meeting decided to bin the old format and go back to the 2015 rules. One week later, that decision was reversed as everyone was informed such a option was not acceptable and so the elimination format remained. In Bahrain the format failed again, although arguably slightly less so in Q3, and so there was another meeting - in which the idea of going back to the last format which worked was taken off the table at the beginning. At the time the only format which seemed to be gaining any traction was the idea of an aggregate qualifying. Here a drivers time would be aggregated from their two fastest laps in a session - but that would never have worked because under the elimination rules most drivers were only able to complete one lap before being eliminated. Finally after months of arguing someone must have gave in at the top and allowed the 2015 format as a selectable option, an option which was seized by everyone concerned. A few days later it was confirmed by the FIA that from the Chinese GP onward we will go back to the nice, simple and functional qualifying rules of 2015. So lets see how much difference it actually makes to the grid on Sunday.

Speaking of the grid, there will be a couple of changes to it - firstly Lewis Hamilton is entering the weekend knowing he has to drop five places due to a gearbox change. The gearbox was cracked when Bottas rammed him in Bahrain and the team decided that this race was the one where grid position mattered least and recovery from 6th at best would be easiest. This is down to the long back straight and strong DRS settings. The other change is the return of Fernando Alonso the McLaren driver was cleared to drive yesterday and following FP1 this morning was given permission to compete in the rest of the weekend. So last race's star rookie Vandoorne was free to complete the Superformula pre-season test instead... but I'm sure he'd rather be in the McLaren, even if it is a little slow and uncompetitive.

The Venue

The Shanghai circuit for this weekend's race is one of the polarising venues the ensemble of teams and drivers will deal with. Some folk think it is an evil scourge on the calendar made of corners that don't make sense cobbled together for the sake of symbolism rather than racing. Others think is isn't too bad - yet surprisingly in the era of engine dominance it has managed to produce decent races. Even if it does look as if the layout was pieced together out of left over bits of scalextric track, and you had to use up all the curved pieces. But in a new feature (one that probably won't last) blog HQ will examine the good and bad of the Chinese GP venue

The Good

Food, when struggling to wrap your head around the questionable design choices that have been made in Shanghai - the local food is probably a good distraction... if my local take away is anything to go by. Nothing like drowning your confusion in a oversized bowl of Salt & Pepper spicy fried chicken and egg fried rice, the thought of which will now make me rather hungry and afflicted with a craving for Chinese food. Aside from the culinary options there are parts of the track which are almost as appealing - turn one for example is quite nice, turn two is even tolerable... just. But turns three and four are needless and terrible. In fact most of the middle sector isn't bad at all and the final corner is rather nice - so there is something to look forward to on track and off it.

The Bad

Now I know I have already accepted turn one as being... acceptable - the majority of the opening sequence of corners can only be described as annoying. Yet at the same time they do get credit for being unique and they certainly are instantly recognisable - to those in the know that is. Print a picture of the Chinese GP layout and show it to my mother and ask her to identify it - I would get a very confused face in return. So on the whole I can't necessarily complain too much about the opening phase of the lap - just because it's not that entertaining when driving about in the simulator... However at the other end of the circuit we have what can only be described as an abomination, not quite on the same scale as the blasphemous "Bus Stop" chicane at spa, but quite bad. Turn 11 is made from the very fires of hell itself, it doesn't really serve that much of a purpose as an overtaking spot and is needlessly sharp. I'd be tempted to place a mirrored version of Magny-Cours "Nurburgring" chicane feeding into the long banked turn 12. Yes it would replace a potential overtaking zone with one that isn't, but it would be far more interesting. Besides the hairpins at either end of the lap provide plenty of overtaking as we have seen in previous years. 

The Form Guide

Well once again laziness has meant that this post is happening after the first day of practice, so we have a more reasonable idea of how things are going to play out. The traditional contenders are enjoying the top of the timesheets all to themselves - Mercedes lead FP1 and Ferrari lead FP2, hopefully meaning all four drivers will be closer going into qualifying tomorrow. Rosberg seems to have the edge over Hamilton this weekend, like he did in Bahrain before the tables turned on Saturday. But this time Lewis has a grid penalty to contend with and thus will be moved down the grid regardless of what happens, thus making Sunday more interesting. 

Beyond the top two teams, Ricciardo for Red Bull and Mad Max for the junior team were leading the cavalry charge for the rest of the pack with Sainz and Hulkenberg close at hand. This is a reasonably good omen for the rest of the weekend because the pace isn't grouped into team order - there is a mix up throughout the mid-field. The FP2 times were also quite closely matched in the central group of cars, a second covered Force India, Williams, Toro Rosso and Red Bull - which accounts for the points positions. 

This weekend Haas seem to be a little further off the pace than they were in Bahrain, mostly because Shangai does have more of a downforce oriented configuration and not one where the Ferrari engine can make up some of the chassis deficit. The same problem is causing Williams to fall to the lower end of the mid-field as well, and hurting Sauber even more as they struggle for finances. Sauber, Renault, Manor and Haas do seem to be forming a group at the bottom of the pack, and if the race doesn't see some bizarre strategies or inclement weather - points might be a little on the unlikely side for those teams. 

Speaking of the weather, the newly redressed qualifying format might be held in the wet this time as rain is predicted to hover around the circuit all day. Depending on when the clouds open up there may be a light drizzle or a more significant downpour, it is estimated that the bulk of the rain will fall after qualifying has finished but who knows. It will be the first time the teams have run a proper wet session this year, so it will be interesting to see how the relative pace changes - last year showed us that in the event of rain Red Bull moved forward while Williams fell back. Furthermore, what will Haas do in the rain - in NASCAR as soon as the rain falls the race is red-flagged so they might forget that here in F1, you drive about when it gets a bit damp. It is a relief on the whole that the new, old qualifying format has been re-instated, because elimination qualifying in the wet will probably end up being a disaster... more than it already was.