Chinese Grand Prix 2013 - Preview

After a three week absence, Formula One returns this weekend as the high-octane circus descends upon the Chinese Shanghai International Circuit.

It's hard to believe that the Chinese Grand Prix has been a fixture on the F1 calendar for nearly a decade now. But, in spite of memorable victories for Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg in recent years, none of the nine races that have been held at Shanghai particularly stand out as classic encounters.

Perhaps that's because of the track layout, which, whilst being one of the most demanding on the calendar, particularly in terms of front-end grip, isn't all that conducive to overtaking. The introduction of DRS along the gargantuan back straight has gone some way to addressing this, but it has made passing into the turn 14 hairpin perhaps a little too easy.

This year, a second DRS zone is being added along the pit straight to go along with the existing one in a bid to boost overtaking opportunities. The tyre allocation meanwhile is identical to that of last year, with the soft compound making its debut alongside the medium compound, which has been at used at both Grand Prix so far in 2013.

Whilst a pecking order of sorts has emerged during the opening rounds at Melbourne and Sepang, predicting who'll be the most competitive at Shanghai is tough business. Both weekends have been affected by rain, either in qualifying or the race itself, blurring the picture even more.

After the infamous 'Multi 21' affair, the spotlight is inevitable going to be on Red Bull. I won't go into detail about the repercussions of Sebastian Vettel's actions after posting about it previously, but there's no doubt that the gloves will be off between the German and teammate Mark Webber if the pair are in a position to do battle on track again.

Red Bull may have appeared the quickest car then, but the reality isn't quite so straightforward. The evidence from the curtain-raiser at Melbourne suggests the RB9 is harder on its tyres and thus possibly still slower than its principal rivals - Ferrari and Lotus - over a race distance, who were both hobbled by circumstance in Malaysia.

Ferrari of course shot itself in the foot by failing to bring in Fernando Alonso to the pits to replace his badly damaged nose, and Felipe Massa lost ground by switching from intermediate tyres to slicks before the track was fully dry. Both drivers however were right at the sharp end in qualifying and thus should have the pace to be major contenders for victory this weekend.

Lotus meanwhile suffered from poor qualifying performances by its drivers, with Kimi Raikkonen lining up seventh (before being demoted to tenth for impeding Nico Rosberg) and Romain Grosjean eleventh. This effectively removed them from contention even before the red lights went out on Sunday afternoon.

Raikkonen in particular showed some good race pace in the latter stages at Malaysia, but being caught up in battles with the likes of Nico Hulkenberg and Sergio Perez prevented him from making any meaningful inroads into the Red Bull and Mercedes-dominated top four. Lotus still have the tyre wear factor on their side and, so long as they avoid another qualifying catastrophe, will be a threat.

Therefore, we can anticipate a closely fought three-way battle between Red Bull, Ferrari and Lotus - not too dissimilar to the one we saw at Melbourne, albeit with perhaps less of an advantage for the lattermost team. All of that means that it's hard to take Lewis Hamilton's assertion that his Mercedes team are now the second strongest in the field too seriously.

The pace of the Silver Arrows was clearly no match for the Red Bulls at Malaysia, even if both Hamilton and Rosberg were marginal on fuel in the latter stages, and their three-four finish would not have been possible if not for the travails of Ferrari and Lotus. Another solid top six finish for one or both cars would be a good result for the Brackley squad this weekend.

Meanwhile, McLaren appeared to have made some progress with their troublesome MP4-28, though it's difficult to assess just how much of that was down to the aforementioned problems for Ferrari and Lotus. Jenson Button was on course for a commendable fifth place finish before a botched pit-stop put paid to a solid afternoon's work by the 2009 champion.

Getting both cars into Q3 - at the hands of two drivers not renowned for their one-lap pace - was nonetheless an achievement, and team manager Jonathan Neale is adamant that the team now have a much stronger understanding of their radical machine than at a start of the campaign.

A number of upgrades will be applied at China, but it remains to be seen how far these will catapult the Woking team into the frame. Behind the three leading teams, we can thus expect a battle between Mercedes, McLaren and Force India for the minor points paying positions.

Vijay Mallya's team have apparently got to the bottom of the wheelnut issues which forced both cars to retire at Sepang; Adrian Sutil and Paul Di Resta showed strong pace and will be looking to continue where they left off in Melbourne. Nico Hulkenberg should challenge for points for Sauber, whilst a top ten finish for one or both of the Toro Rosso drivers is a possibility if some of the front-runners run into issues.

Sadly for Williams fans, it appears the team has, at least temporarily, regressed to its 2011 status as the weakest of the midfield runners, leading to some desperate over-driving by Pastor Maldonado in both races so far. He will need to demonstrate some more patience if he is to avoid his novice teammate Valtteri Bottas, who has been quietly impressive, getting the better of him.

Another driver who was turned heads is Jules Bianchi, who has extracted more pace from the Marussia car than anybody initially thought possible. Whilst it's likely to be a matter of time before Caterham can close the gap, the Frenchman's 13th place finish at Sepang could prove very useful to the team in the season-long battle for that coveted tenth place in the constructors' standings.

Predictions - Qualifying

1. Vettel, 2. Alonso, 3. Massa, 4. Webber, 5. Hamilton, 6. Raikkonen, 7. Rosberg, 8. Grosjean, 9. Button, 10. Sutil

Predictions - Race

1. Alonso, 2. Vettel, 3. Raikkonen, 4. Massa, 5. Webber, 6. Hamilton, 7. Button, 8. Sutil, 9. Hulkenberg, 10. Di Resta

Whilst it will be Vettel who will continue his stranglehold on pole position, I believe Alonso could have been a major contender for victory at Sepang if not for his first-lap error. If the Spaniard is able to avoid such entanglements at turn one on this occasion, the superior race pace of the Ferrari will take the two-time champion to his first victory of the year, neatly coinciding with his 200th F1 start, ahead of Vettel and Raikkonen.

Massa and Webber will turn in a pair of solid performances with Hamilton unable to better sixth, though his teammate Rosberg will find himself at the receiving end of some contact with Grosjean. Further back, Sutil will bag another handful of points, with Hulkenberg just holding off the second Force India of Di Resta to take ninth.