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Reaction to Chinese GP Sprint Race

Reaction to Chinese GP Sprint Race

P1 with Matt and Tommy Mar 14, 2026 32 min
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About this episode

Matt and Tommy dive into the Chinese Grand Prix sprint race, discussing the impact of new F1 regulations on racing dynamics. They highlight the increased overtaking, especially at race starts, and debate the artificial nature of battery deployment tactics versus traditional wheel-to-wheel action. The hosts analyze key performances, including Ferrari's strong starts, Lewis Hamilton's competitive return, and challenges faced by drivers like Kimmy Antonelli and Max Verstappen. They also touch on strategic battles, safety car incidents, and the evolving sprint format's effectiveness. The episode blends technical insights with fan perspectives on the season's unpredictable new era.

Topics: chinese grand prix sprint new f1 regulations battery deployment tactics ferrari race starts lewis hamilton performance kimmy antonelli starts max verstappen struggles sprint race format overtaking dynamics safety car incidents
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Hello everybody and welcome back to the P1 Podcast with Matt and Tommy.
Podcasts galore this weekend because of course it's a sprint weekend
and we have had the Chinese Grand Prix sprint and a lot to talk about as always.
These new regulations are serving something, whether you don't like them or you do like them.
Overarching feelings, let's just go straight in with how we feel after that one.
And look, I understand some people had some comments from our last podcast
where perhaps we went in very hard on the regulations
and actually forgot to really talk about SQ3s. We apologize for that.
But after the sprint today, my overriding feeling is that that was pretty great to watch.
Now, I am as a Formula One fan having an internal struggle of what I'm watching
and whether I should enjoy it. That's kind of the thing I'm sat here going,
oh, I've always wanted loads of overtakes. We've now got them, but it's done in a different way
to what I like. But I think overall, the first half of that sprint was great to watch.
And yes, there's battery deployment tactics. Some people might argue that there's no skill
involved in that. I would disagree. And it kept it interesting for the first half of the sprint.
And I remember sprints last year where we'd get literally no overtakes and it would stay in
basically the position that they started in. I would take that as in this, what we've just seen
over that any day of the week. That's the trade-off, isn't it?
Of basically last year, the problem with the sprints was we were in this dirty air formula
where the only way you could overtake was once people were on different tires or had different
strategies going on. So essentially, the first part of the race was redundant
almost in last year's regulations because it was who got to turn one first and everyone just sits
there for the rest of it. Whereas now, actually, you're finding, based on the evidence of one
grand prix that we've had, but it kind of continued into this sprint, that the most exciting part is
the start because they're swapping positions. Now, I'm also feeling massively like these regulations
are being saved enormously by the fact that Ferrari can start well, and whether Ferrari
not having these amazing race starts would mean that, yeah, we wouldn't be seeing this.
But you're right, we're seeing a lot more action. It's just whether you're enjoying that action
because it's not the late-breaking dive bombs under braking that we're used to seeing.
Yeah, I mean, the midfield were also providing a lot of action. So if we're talking about
Ferrari saving the regulations, it's not as if we're not seeing overtakes anywhere else.
Yes, Ferrari are saving us from the Mercedes domination. That's the key thing here because
George would have probably just driven away had he been able to use his battery in an efficient way.
There are some triggering words in there, I apologize. But yeah, it was still fun to watch
and let's see how it evolves over the course of the season. Question, P1 Patriot member,
Piper MZ Mimic X, does the sprint format work super well with these regulations?
That was pretty exciting. The sprint format is a debate in itself as to how it sits. I think at
this point in the season, and it always comes back to the worth of it. Right now at this point in
the season, we don't, well, we think George Russell will probably win the championship,
but we don't know at this stage. No, someone isn't 200 points down the road and it feels
like this is meaningless because at the start of the season, everyone's trying to pick up as
many points as they can. And as for the racing itself, the sprint works, yes, very well. Had
it not been for Leclerc and Hamilton fighting in the midpoint of that race, we may well have had
back and forth action until the last lap because George Russell and that Mercedes did not have,
at least they weren't showing, a gargantuan advantage like we see in qualifying. And that was
the same in Australia until George got a bit of clean air thanks to Ferrari not pitting under the
VSC. So yeah, I think the sprint does work very well and goes back to your point, Tommy, because
Ferrari are able to put themselves in a position that causes problems. And overtake mode is clearly
showing that it is built for racing in the fact that a car and a driver that might well be two
or three tenths of laps slower if it was a time trial, but that doesn't matter because overtake
mode gives you such an advantage over the car in front of you that you do get to see lots of racing.
It's all about what you'd rather see really, isn't it? Because you look at the qualifying pace
and if we didn't have this situation of the rules and the battery deployment and the overtake mode
and the boosting and stuff, George Russell would just be gone, you know, winning every race by a
mile. And even the likes of Kimi Antonelli, he will talk about in a bit because he had another
very, very similar race to Australia and the start. Even with that Mercedes advantage,
where it seems like they are so clear and qualifying, you can't really get away. It's
quite hard to escape from it and that keeps the pack closer. And I understand that people
are not enjoying the artificialness of it because it is and these are the regulations
that we've got. But as I've said before, you know, we've had DRS, we've had extremely degrading
tyres and things in Formula One to provide entertainment. And yeah, this regulation,
it does seem all about qualifying, feels very flat. But in the race, you're seeing drivers
swap positions because you can't get away almost of the way the rules are designed with this
boost and overtake mode. Exactly. And you watch at the end of the season where the battery perhaps
is less of a factor, that's what I'm anticipating and predicting. And then we have a poor sprint
every time we go out there. There will be a lot of people that will be sat there going,
God, I kind of wish I'd appreciated the fact we had lots of battling for the lead,
despite it being on the artificial side for sure. But at the same time, like yes,
it is artificial, it is extremely advantageous at times. But for my level of enjoyment, I like it
when they're battling into the apex of a corner, which we saw a lot. We saw a lot of side by side
action. If it was just buy, buy, buy every time, I'd get it, like what the hell is this? This is
DRS times 1000. But it's not a lot of the time. And there's at least some saving grace in this
that we are seeing wheel to wheel action. And a lot of the let's not kid ourselves that a lot of the
DRS overtakes Westland dunks on the straight. So actually, you're still getting artificial
passing like we did with DRS. But I would much rather see it of like Lewis Hamilton going
around the outside of turn one, then I would him just breezing past in the DRS zone. And
for all the kind of complaints about the new rules, and it's not everyone's cup of tea,
and I'm still kind of getting my head around it. The one thing I was hoping, which we were talking
about at the start of the season, was that these new regulations could mean you're passing at different
parts of the track. Now, you can't argue that's not happening. It's different turns. We're not
seeing just this is the regulated zone that you pass in through DRS. How many overtakes,
you know, even I think Antonelli even made a move into the final turn, you'd never see that in
in years gone by because you just wait for the DRS straight. So and that's exactly what you wished
for coming into this season. Like you literally like the battery is going to bring us different
unorthodox crazy overtakes in places we wouldn't expect. Exactly, because that's why I want it.
We'll never be happy as Formula One fans. I think, you know, the artificial argument,
I'm sat here and I'm like, yes, Formula One have overtaking aids, all of which are artificial.
If we want non-artificial natural racing, we have to go back to the 2000s. And back then
and George Russell win by 40 seconds every race because he's got his car. Yeah. So
I mean, this is not a backtrack because I stand on everything I said yesterday because we were
talking about sprint qualifying. And that was a it is a disaster. The cars are fundamentally
flawed for a Saturday. But what we saw today, I think was enjoyable. And yeah, I mean, I was on
the edge of my seat when they were going side by side. And I'm sure there were a lot of people
out there as well that were the same. Question from Fergie's right ref, should Leclerc and
Hamilton have focused on catching Russell or continue in fighting? I do wonder in these
regulations, as we mentioned about the fact that you don't want people to let you get away. We
saw in the Australian Grand Prix how drivers were when Russell and Leclerc were battling at the start.
It brought Hamilton into play, it brought Antonelli into play, even though he had that
really poor start in Australia. And he managed to get back and then you had the four of them
all together. There's another kind of side to it that you wonder, could teammates work together,
swap positions, and use that extra bit of battery that you have being a second behind
as an advantage to kind of gain lap time. And as we saw there, the Ferrari drivers were very
much all about just racing each other rather than working together, which is no surprise,
it was brilliant to watch. I think we said when Hamilton joined at Ferrari, a lot of people were
like, oh, surely they're going to collide and things. And we said, no, they are two of the best
wheel-to-wheel racers in the sport, and two of the fairest as well. And that's what we saw there,
where it's like, it's great, tough racing, but it's fair, even if Charles maybe wasn't all too happy
with it. Yeah, they came pretty close. It is an interesting theory, but the problem is,
it's like, and I don't know, I can't believe I'm about you to football analogy, it's like asking
a striker to pass it across goal for your teammate to score, or just shooting at goal and hoping
that you score. The amount of times someone's ego will take over, like, well, I just want to score.
It's similar in this situation where like, you're almost propelling your teammate into a chance of
winning the race when the last thing any teammate wants to do is to allow their other teammate to
beat them in the race. So yeah, there's a lot of factors there. And it's, yes, I mean, on paper,
for sure, they should have focused on catching Russell because they were marginally slower,
but with the overtake, as we've mentioned, they could have taken it to Russell. I think maybe
Leclerc was hoping that Hamilton would work together with him because he said there was a
bit too much fighting, or Charles was just hoping that Hamilton would roll over and just let Charles
through, which obviously is not going to happen. I don't think Lewis should have given the position
up to Charles to go and catch George. But it was great to watch the fighting. It was close
at times. There was a bit of a comment wasn't there on the radio from Charles about does Lewis
know the size of these cars because it got pretty marginal at one point. But I loved it. I loved
watching these two fight. Some people were listening might think, you don't enjoy Hamilton
being competitive. I genuinely do because it's great to watch. And Leclerc, I obviously believe,
can win a world championship and put himself in the Hall of Fame and what better driver to go up
against than the seven time champion of the world. So it's great to see Hamilton back in Formula One
in a competitive, actually enjoying the car and being able to fight at the front.
I will say as a caveat, please, Lewis, stay like this. Don't do what literally happened after
China last year and start to struggle with the car again. Lewis literally won the China spent
last year and we were going, oh my God, what an entrance to Ferrari for Lewis. So please,
just continue this trend. Yeah, I agree. It's great to see Hamilton back at the front and
had that amazing start to go on to that race start. We thought, how on earth is he going to
get into the lead at fourth place? But the surprising thing about the Ferraris is they
have it in the corners that they can still fight. And I think what surprised us so much about that
start and Hamilton getting into the lead, I think, was because we were so ingrained into thinking,
it's either turn one. And I think this is generally like the way Formula One's gone and
maybe it's this dirty air era as well that we've had just previously. We're so ingrained to be like
turn one is the be all and end all of Formula One is the most important thing. And once you're
there, you're kind of locked in position. Ferrari, that car, they still managed to make the time
up. It looks great in the corners. And Hamilton was able to make his way through a couple of cars
to get up into second, mainly thanks to another poor start from Antonelli, and then dive down the
inside of Russell in an unconventional passing place. Was that unconventional? I guess it's
meaningful. That's a pretty popular move for China. But yeah, I mean, it's not down the back
straight. It's literally becoming a trend. We've seen two races now and both times a
Ferrari driver has gone from fourth to first in the first lap. And I would like to continue
seeing this for the rest of time. And we didn't get the start light. And that's without the start
light being like 0.1 of a millisecond. Yeah, it was a couple of seconds and then they launched it.
So it's Hamilton. In that initial phase, I was like, oh, Hamilton, yeah, pretty quick off the
line, but he's not going to get George. And then it seems to say what Lando has been saying about
Ferrari aerodynamically is the best in the corners. And I believe him. I genuinely think that Ferrari
do have potentially the best package in the corners. So we'll be interesting when we get to
some high downforce tracks later on in the year. But awesome, awesome to have Ferrari saving us
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slash podcast to learn more. Question. People on page remember Oscar Glaser. Does
Antonelli not have enough experience to fight for wins with George? So it's two from two now for
Antonelli and poor starts. Yes, these cars are difficult. We literally saw Max Verstappen struggle
off the line this time around. But to have back to back bad starts is becoming slightly concerning
for Kimmy because not only clearly it's difficult to set up these cars to get ready for a start,
but there will be that added mental pressure now for Antonelli of I'm in a championship winning car
and I'm making mistakes at the start. If you think of how people would talk about Lando's starts,
that was a big mental burden for him. And I think Kimmy needs to get on top of this ASAP before it
becomes a thing for him that will just constantly be something he thinks about. So Antonelli put
himself massively on the back for he was only able to get back to fifth, especially after the 10
second time penalty as well with the Lunge on Hajar, I think it was. So and there was damage
there. I don't know if Kimmy picked up a little bit of damage as well, but overall a pretty scruffy
sprint from Kimmy. I was apologetic for him in Australia. I regret giving him a nine and driver
ratings. But this time round, once he's finding a brand new car, you're in your second season.
This time you're going, oh, Kimmy, can we lock in, please? 100%. That's exactly what we said
during the watch along right from the start again. It's two from two now, a poor start from
Antonelli. And yes, these cars are very difficult to get off the line. We've seen
the other drivers struggling as well and many other drivers struggling. But for it to happen in
both races, when Mercedes have this big advantage in qualifying, they need to make the most of that.
So for Kimmy just to drop back right from the start. And it wasn't even, it's not him dropping
back behind the first starting Ferrari's in his fourth. He's going all the way down to seventh
place. I think it was seventh again, exactly the same as Melbourne. And the problem is then you
get yourself in a situation where, yes, you've made contact, there's Jeopardy there,
that again in a sprint, a 10 second penalty in a sprint is enormous because it's a very short
race. The pack are close. And yeah, you find yourself in a situation where even the McLaren's who
finished 50 seconds behind them in Australia and seemingly unable to challenge at the front,
they were a lot closer, that has to be said. But such is this new battery deployment and
boost and overtaking everything that you can't just breeze past like we saw and get away because
it gives the person behind. And actually Antonelli, I can't remember, I think it was on Piastri
where he passed him and then we were watching the replay of the front. And you just see
Antonelli would be making progress and it kind of cut back and it's like, oh, Oscar's back past again.
So yeah, it's not going well for Antonelli at the moment.
It certainly isn't. Another driver it's not going well for is your boy. Let's go to a question.
E76860 Edwin, will Verstappen be able to even get P5 in the driver's championship?
Probably not. Not if they're in the midfield. I do think it is, if I'm sniffing a lot of
copium here, the problem is in that previous season, we had races where they were just
woeful. I mean, look at Brazil where they hadn't got the car set up properly. That was a sprint
weekend as well. Obviously he's not in that situation now where they can fix that problem
and he fly through the field and that's the most concerning thing for Red Bull.
However, it seems like a lot of their problems this weekend have been through the corners,
which in a weird way maybe is better that you can improve your car aerodynamically
than you've got a huge power deficiency that we've kind of seen in years gone by where,
you know, look at McLaren Honda or even like Aston Martin now, right? That if you're
behind on your engine, it's kind of curtain. So that's the maybe saving grace that it's not
going to happen at every track, but they are in struggle town big time at the moment. And
yeah, the prediction of Max not winning a race. I know it's early days, but I've gone back to
being like, I regret that prediction. I'm like, no, that prediction is probably going to come true
now, particularly if one, but at what cost? Yeah, exactly. I do love it. And it's like,
after Australia, I might win a race after this one. And then we'll go to the next race in Japan.
Oh, he might win a race, although to be fair, I think you will struggle similarly around Japan.
Poor start from Max, of course, almost stalled on the grid, which is not something you really ever
see from Max Verstappen. And then he was involved in all kinds of chaos, which was he had a permanent
minibox the entire way through, which to be fair, I absolutely respect from F1 TV direction. They've
gone, you know what Max Verstappen is in the midfield, that's going to be cinema. So let's
leave that one up there and just keep focusing on the main feed. So that was that was good to watch.
In terms of the pace of the Red Bull, I don't really change my stance. I think from what we
said yesterday of the fact that the form will chop and change, it's clear that the Red Bull is not
set up well at all around this track. I'd be interested to see if they do make a rather large
step forward going into main qualifying, because of course Park Fermi is opened up, which means
that the teams can make changes. So anything they've learned from the sprint race, they can
change into the final main parts of the weekend. So let's see, Max firstly needs to confidently get
through Q2, which it's true, it could be a struggle. I mean, one thing to mention as well
is we were talking about his race and the struggles of pace, but you know, it seems all
the disaster at the moment, even when he was passing Hadja, you know, he locked up
brand wide and it's just not not going well at all for him. It's just so bizarre to see
all these struggles and I think the frustrations of him as much as he says, oh, even if I had a
great car, I'd still hate these rules. It's just going to add to that frustration even more
if he doesn't like the new rules and he's fighting Alpine and Hasses for eighth.
I love that as well. There's lots of people on social media that are strange, but there are
and then and I've already seen them now jumping on the, well, we were told that Max could win in a
Hasse, which I think is what Helmut Marco said. I think that's what Helmut Marco said.
I'm just, I'm guessing right now, I might be wrong, but that was a bit of a narrative and if
you believed that, you've clearly not thought about what Formula 1 has been about for the last,
God knows how many years, usually the best car wins unsurprisingly. Next question,
people on Patreon remember Madeline Crash Cars, what on earth went on with Leclerc at that safety
car restart? I was thinking exactly the same thing, you know, safety car, three laps to go in the
sprint. Here we go, Charles Leclerc on soft tyres. Let's see what you can do. We'll yo-yo all the way
to the finish and see who manages to overtake last, but that did not happen because he had
wheel spin behind the safety car, I think it was, and asked what on earth was that wheel spin and
then had another batch of wheel spin when he went to go and restart behind George Russell. He
said after the sprint in the broadcast about the fact that he'd seen George have a little swapper
and he thought this is my chance and then decided to have a bigger swapper because the lack of grip
was exactly the same in his car. So it's a shame because we were sort of robbed of a grandstand
finish, but that being said, you know, George was the faster car and the faster driver,
potentially we don't know who knows who knows who's the fastest driver, probably Portoletto,
we don't know. But in terms of, you know, it would have been tough for Charles to beat George,
but it would have given us at least a bit of a will to will action with the wonderful overtake mode.
Yeah, it was a small error, but you can see why he went for it. You've got to take those
opportunities to pounce. And yeah, seeing George go out of shape, that was his opportunity to go
for it and it didn't work out. And it's such a shame because that whole safety car, as they
were circulating, it was like, wow, this is going to be great. This is exactly what we need because
we've seen on the evidence of the start, that George can't get away. But unfortunately,
the kind of the wheel spin allowed George to get away. And even at the end, you know, Leclerc
did catch in at the end that you just thought, it's that classic, like one more lap, one more lap.
But yeah, it was a mistake from Charles. I will put my hands up and say it. And it was annoying
to say the least. Question from people on Patreon, remember grubbly,
why did it take so long to sort Holkenberg's car out?
Yeah, I wouldn't be too kind of annoyed at the marshals and things here. I think these new cars,
no doubt, there's probably a lot of safety procedures and things with how they're all
electrical powers. We've seen it when Kers got introduced, you know, a mechanic coming in and
getting electrocuted when touching, touching a car went back when Kers was introduced. So there'll
be a lot of procedures where they need to wait for the whole car and everything to shut down
safely and stuff. So this is a situation where, yes, it's very frustrating, particularly at the end
of a race, when you want to see as many racing laps as possible, even more so in a sprint,
when you don't get many racing laps as it is, and they're being eaten into by a safety car.
But I think this is just the nature of Formula One with the electrical power.
It certainly is. It was, it did feel like they were moving in slow motion. But then again,
as you say, there's a lot of safety procedures and the marshals are unpaid, they're volunteers,
and the fact that there are people out there that will sacrifice weekends to do this sort
of stuff for the sport is obviously awesome. I still don't know how I feel about the fact
they are volunteers. Formula One is a multi-billion dollar company, but that's a different
conversation. In terms of the Hulkenberg thing, maybe they need a couple more people there.
It felt like just two people trying to move a car with someone else in the tractor, but
yeah, it wasn't that long. It just felt long because we were so
eager to get underway again for the end of the sprint. I think it literally took them two laps.
We have seen, I think Monza was a few years ago, where we genuinely were behind the safety car
for like eight laps. So it was two laps. It was nothing. It was just the fact we were feeling
very impatient. So well done to the marshals for moving Hulk's car. And we did get some racing
action at the end. And finally, a quick shout out to firstly, Liam Lawson, and secondly,
Oli Berman, both of them scoring points in the sprint, beating both the Red Bulls.
But it's just happened, of course, not scoring in the sprint. Sorry.
Thanks for that.
I just thought I'd just felt good to kind of make you feel a little bit sad.
But Lawson did phenomenally well. He was on the hard tyres, a different strategy. I think it was
only three drivers that started on the hards. Lawson was one of them. Slightly questioned it at
the time, like, wow, hard tyres, really. And then stayed out as well after the safety car,
which I thought he'd be a sitting duck. But no, he fought hard. He lost a couple of positions.
He was up in P5. But to still score a couple of points and hold off Oli Berman, who also
didn't fit under the safety car and stayed on his mediums. Brilliant drives from the pair of them.
Shame for Lawson that in years gone by when the field spread wasn't as extreme.
You know, this would have looked like the absolute, could have been, you know,
like the Pierre Gasly Monza strategy, because obviously he didn't pit. But unfortunately,
for him, the top cars were so far ahead that they could come in, change their tyres, and be back
out, most of them in front of him. But yeah, still an amazing job from Lawson. And yeah,
a great performance. Racing Bulls looking very strong again, same with Haas with Oli Berman.
That midfield pack was very close again. The gap between 8th and 12th was unbelievable,
which sadly has some extra stappin' in it. But yeah, they were battling all the time. We had
Ocon versus Gasly again, which was, I mean, sign me up if that's going to be a thing every race.
So yeah, it was good between them and yeah, a great drive in particular from Lawson.
Indeed it was. There we go. We are done and dusted for the sprint race. I hope you enjoyed it.
Lots of action. And we look forward to reading how you felt the sprint went from your perspective,
because I think it is divisive, very divisive thing, especially when we see lots of overtakes.
So I'll be very keen to get your thoughts, whether that's on audio or over on YouTube.
So thank you everybody for tuning in. We will be back literally later on for qualifying
for the Chinese Grand Prix. And then of course, back again tomorrow for the main race. We'll be
live on Twitch, YouTube and Dream11. So come and join us over there. And that is it. Tommy,
final thoughts please. Final thoughts. Bring on, bring on Oli and hopefully,
please be slightly good, because maybe they need to switch based on this year that the
sprints are now good and quality is a bit rubbish. Maybe the format of the sprint weekend needs to
change again so you don't have the highs of a sprint followed by a mech qualifying. You get it
the other way around. And also speaking of the qualifying, I think something we do have to very
quickly speak about that perhaps we were wrong about yesterday, which we have to put our hands
up about was the fact of the graphic, which is circulating that it's a Mercedes PU glitch,
which is causing the freezing of the speedometer. So I just wanted to mention that at the end of
this podcast as well, because some people quite rightly said, look guys, I don't think this is
right. And yeah, it appears that that's not the case. It's just so coincidental that obviously
our brains were working overdrive. And you can see why we thought that after they did that whole
speed master thing and cut away. And they're obviously doing a lot on the other side of things to
make new rules and criticisms be hidden. So when you see that speedo freezing when they've already
done something similar on social media, obviously the initial reaction from fans and everything is
to be like, oh, they're trying to kind of hide it here. But it's clear that the Mercedes drivers
had that kind of flat lining timing on their timing and all the other cars. It was fine for
on their telemetry, not their time on their telemetry. Sorry. Yeah, it's fine. It's early.
It's very early. But yeah, just just wanted to mention that at the end, because we are just
two globes that try and get everything right. But sometimes you're wrong. So there you go.
Thanks, everybody. We'll see you later on for qualifying lots of love. Bye. Goodbye.
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