All info you need to see before the 2025 Chinese GP starts

After an interesting season-opener in Melbourne with McLaren as the class of the field, Formula 1 arrives in Shanghai with clear ideas about the pecking order.

Lando Norris and McLaren are the early favorites to win championships in 2025. However, the FIA may have already started to tighten things up at the front, with more strict tests for rear wing flexibility to address the "mini-DRS" saga.

Max Verstappen and Red Bull took advantage of the changing conditions and put up a fight against McLaren. The Dutchman won last year's race in China and Helmut Marko has been optimistic about the team's chances early in the season. Of course, newcomer Liam Lawson struggled mightily at Melbourne and the team will surely keep a close eye on him.

Ferrari is the unpredictable team among the Top 4, with Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton only in P8 and P10 in the season-opener. Meanwhile, Mercedes grabbed a good amount of points with George Russell third and Kimi Antonelli in fourth. However, they looked far behind McLaren and even Red Bull.

 (Photo by Clive Rose/Getty Images) // Getty Images / Red Bull Content Pool

Seven of the 10 teams scored points in Australia, with Williams (Alex Albon and Carlos Sainz) sitting fourth with 10 points in the World Constructors' Championship. Aston Martin scored eight points with Lance Stroll, while Nico Hulkenberg gave six points to Sauber.

Alpine (Pierre Gasly and Jack Doohan), Racing Bulls (Yuki Tsunoda and Isack Hadjar) and Haas (Esteban Ocon and Oliver Bearman) failed to score.

This weekend will give us the first Sprint Weekend of the year, with Free Practice and the Sprint Qualifying. On Saturday, we will have the Sprint Race followed by Qualifying for Sunday's Grand Prix.

2025 Chinese GP Facts & Figures

The 2025 Chinese Grand Prix is next in the Formula 1 calendar and the event will be the 18th Chinese round as part of the F1 World Championship.

The first World Championship Chinese Grand Prix was celebrated in 2004 and has been celebrated at the same venue each time.

In its first years in the calendar (until 2008), the Chinese Grand Prix was often the final race or was positioned near the end of the campaign. Although a Drivers' title was never decided in China, the event gave us some impactful moments in championship fights before. Rubens Barrichello won the first Chinese Grand Prix in 2004, followed by Fernando Alonso winning in 2005 and giving Renault the World Constructors' Championship.

In 2006, Michael Schumacher won his 91st and final F1 race in China, and the win was important in his quest for an eighth title, but his chances eventually faded.

Lewis Hamilton had a chance to close out the championship in his rookie season in 2007. However, delayed pitstop from intermediate tyres to slick ones ended his chances when his car, equipped with worn tyres (the canvas was visible), was beached in the pit-lane entry. Hamilton's and McLaren's "mistake" proved costly that year, with Hamiton losing the title to Kimi Raikkonen (Ferrari) by one point.

Hamilton won in 2008 and entered the final race of the season with strong chances of winning his maiden title, which he won dramatically in Brazil. Sebastian Vettel gave Red Bull its first win and Pole Position in 2009, followed by his teammate Mark Webber for a 1-2.

McLaren won in 2010 and 2011, with Jenson Button and Hamilton, respectively. Nico Rosberg took his maiden win in the 2012 Chinese Grand Prix, also giving Mercedes' factory team its first win since the 1955 Italian Grand Prix. Mercedes had returned to F1 as a team in 2010 and went on to dominate the series from 2014 to 2020.

Pit straight China circuit Shanghai

Alonso won for Ferrari in 2013, while Hamilton achieved his first Pole Position for Mercedes that same weekend. Hamilton went on to win for Mercedes in 2014, 2015, 2017, and 2019 (in F1's 1000th Grand Prix). Rosberg won again in 2016 for Mercedes, while Daniel Ricciardo took a tremendous win in 2018 for Red Bull with great overtakes.

In 2023, Max Verstappen won for Red Bull in China's return to the F1 calendar.

The most successful driver in the Chinese Grand Prix is Lewis Hamilton with six wins (two with McLaren and four with Mercedes).

Among teams, Mercedes leads with six wins, ahead of Ferrari's four. McLaren and Red Bull have three wins apiece in Shanghai.

Shanghai International Circuit

The Shanghai International Circuit includes probably the prettiest Turn 1-Turn 2-Turn 3 section at any start of a Formula 1 event, with the long corners looking beautiful when packed with the F1 grid of cars.

The circuit, which was opened on 6 June 2004, is 5.451 km long and was designed by Hermann Tilke. The Grand Prix Circuit has 16 corners and has hosted every F1 Chinese Grand Prix.

Startgrid 2016 Chinese F1 GP

There will be 56 laps (305.066 km race distance) and two DRS zones in the race. Between Turns 13 and 14, there is a 1.2 km straight which includes the longest DRS zone of the track.

The current records around the layout are the following:

Outright record: 1:31.095 min by Sebastian Vettel in 2018, driving the Ferrari SF71H at an average speed of 215,419 km/h.

Fastest Lap during a race: 1:32.238 min by Michael Schumacher in 2004, driving the Ferrari F2004 at an average speed of 211,750 km/h.

2025 Chinese Grand Prix - Tyres

The dry tyres for the 2025 Chinese Grand Prix will be the C2 as P Zero White hard, C3 as P Zero Yellow Medium, and C4 as P Zero Red soft.

Pirelli's views for the weekend were explained in a press release: "The trio of compounds is the same as last year. However, one must remember that all the compounds are different to those from last year. The C2 in particular is softer and therefore closer to the C3 than in the past.

An important factor to consider this weekend will be the temperatures. It’s the first time that Shanghai hosts the Grand Prix in March when average temperatures rarely exceed 18 °C. Although in fact, the forecast for the weekend is to seem them climb above 20 °C as from Friday, reaching a high of 26 °C on Saturday. While this is therefore considerably warmer than usual at this time, it is actually pretty similar to conditions seen last year for example, when the race was held in the third week of April.

(Photo by Simon Galloway / LAT Images)

There were three interruptions last year – one VSC and two Safety Cars – which significantly influenced the outcome of the race, both in terms of the number of stops and the sequence in which the compounds were used. In the case of the former, three of the drivers who finished in the top ten made just one stop, six pitted twice and one even three time.

 As for the latter, the majority of drivers opted to line up on the grid on the Medium, with the C3 also completing the most stints (46%). However, when it came to the highest mileage, that went to the C2 (57%). The C4 also played its part, with four drivers choosing it for the start, while Fernando Alonso drove his longest stint on this the softest tyre.

A new trophy will make its debut in China, going to whoever takes pole position in Friday afternoon’s Sprint Qualifying. The trophy features an embossed version of the special logo to mark Pirelli’s season-long celebration of reaching its 500th Grand Prix later this year at the Dutch round of the championship, presented on 18 February during Formula 1’s team presentation event at London’s O2 Arena.

Furthermore, at the end of all six of this year’s Sprint Qualifying sessions, the trophy will be personalised with a silver plaque bearing the polesitter’s initials as used to identify the drivers on the timing screens."

Pirelli also explained the dynamics of a Sprint weekend: "While the standard weekend format features two hour-long free practice sessions on Friday and a further hour on Saturday followed by qualifying, the current Sprint format features just one free practice session to start the track action on Friday, followed by a qualifying session later that day. This decides the grid for a 100 kilometre race, approximately one third distance of the normal race, held on Saturday morning, which is followed by qualifying for Sunday’s actual Grand Prix.

Qualifying for the Sprint is split into three segments that are shorter than those for the Grand Prix 12 minutes for SQ1, ten for SQ2 and eight for SQ3. The number of drivers eliminated at the end of each section is the same as in normal qualifying, five at the end of each of the first two sessions. For the first two parts, all drivers must use only the Medium compound, before switching to the Soft for the final session. As for the short race itself, tyre choice is free and there is no need to make a pit stop.

 Getty Images / Red Bull Content Pool

There is also a different slick tyre allocation per driver compared to a standard weekend: they each still have two sets of Hard, but now they get an extra set of Medium, going from three to four and two fewer sets of Soft, from eight to six, for a total of 12 instead of the usual 13.

Introduced for the first time at Silverstone in 2021) there have been 18 Sprint races to date and Max Verstappen has been the master of this discipline with 11 wins so far.

This will be the second year running that Shanghai has hosted an event run to this format and just for a change, the aforementioned Verstappen was the winner. As for the tyres in 2024, 19 runners used a set of Mediums with only Russell gambling on the Soft, which paid off as he made up three places from eleventh on the grid to eighth at the flag."

The minimum starting pressures for the tyres will be 26.5 PSI (front) and 23.0 PSI (rear).

2025 Chinese Grand Prix - Weather Forecast

Friday, March 21st - FP & Sprint Qualifying

Conditions: Mostly sunny and warm

Max. temperature: 26°C

Chance of rain: 0%

Saturday, March 22nd - Sprint Race & Main Qualifying

Conditions: Sunny, breezy and warm

Max. temperature: 28°C

Chance of rain: 0%

Sunday, March 23rd - Main Race

Conditions: Mostly cloudy and warm

Max. temperature: 29°C

Chance of rain: 5%

Who will be on the 2025 Chinese Grand Prix Podium?

Could things be more competitive at the top? Hopefully. However, McLaren's advantage might not be limited to some of the rumoured parts that other teams like Red Bull have reportedly protested against.

 Getty Images / Red Bull Content Pool

Lando Norris had a great showing in Australia, looking determined and fully focused on the task at hand, been if it's hard for him to acknowledge his car's advantage. The British racer was on Pole Position for last year's Sprint and would like to keep that same spot for the upcoming weekend.

Ferrari desperately needs a good result in China to put their 2025 season on the right track, but there's work to do.

The prediction for the top three of the 2025 Chinese Grand Prix is 1. Max Verstappen, 2. Lando Norris, 3. Oscar Piastri.