Chinese GP: Highs and lows

The Chinese Grand Prix wasn't very exciting. Anything but, really, with the only fact that it was the 1000th Grand Prix for the World Championship to be exciting. Still, there are a few highs and lows to be noted from the third race of the season.

Highs:
-Mercedes:
What a recovery from Mercedes. Ferrari seemed to be extremely quick on the Friday, but on the 2 days when it mattered, Mercedes led the way and Ferrari just seemed to have lost out again. Ferrari does not seem to have the pace in most cases and reliability-wise, there is something not going properly. Leclerc being hit by problems in Bahrain and Giovinazzi hit the same kind of problems in the qualifying for the Chinese GP.

-Gasly:
Yes, he may still have been far off the pace in comparison with Verstappen, but he did at least grab a couple of points for the team in P6 and scored the extra point for fastest lap, meaning those 3 points are now equally divided by the top 3 teams. I sincerely hope he can gain confidence with this result, as I do believe his lack of pace partially comes from the lack of confidence. He had 2 incidents during testing, which doesn't help in that concern, so let's hope he can get closer to Max the next few races and show his true potential. He has some great potential and he should be able to showcase it in the Red Bull.

-Räikkönen:
Another solid weekend from Kimi Räikkönen. He did not manage to qualify in the top 10, but on race pace, he did manage to score another few points and sits in P7 in the championship. There seems to be no wear on his skills, something I wasn't too sure about, but his performances during the first 3 races have been top class, especially noting that Giovinazzi has yet to score his first points.

-Albon:
A stupid mistake could have cost a lot for Albon, but a sensational drive on Sunday gave him P10 and 1 extra point. It was a strong race from Alexander, which is remarkable, as he should have been in Formula E by now, instead of driving for Toro Rosso. He is definitely one of the highlights of the season so far, with 2 point-scoring finishes so far. I do still expect him to have a little dorp in performance every now and then, but that is to be expected from a rookie.


Lows:
-Williams:
Nothing to say here, really, apart from again being over a second slower than any other car. Let's hope they can gain some time on the track soon, otherwise this really is a wasted season for the team and in that case, it may be rewarding to put their focus onto the next year and make sure they won't repeat the same mistakes they did this season. A second per lap is just a lit to make up and I'm not so sure they can, especially if others do improve as well.

-Haas:
How about Haas? It haas to be a disappointing weekend for Haas. They did qualify for Q3, but did not manage to put any lap time in due to all the cars being clustered in the final sector, also resulting in the Red Bulls not making their second run. It's easy to blame others, but in this case, I feel like both teams got it over themselves with extremely tight timing and perhaps a bit unlucky with cars ahead slowing down, but in the end, there is 12 minutes in the session to put in a time and even though the track is faster later on, I don't expect the track to be that much faster to stay in early on and hope you can put in 1 lap. But the biggest disappointment was the race, in which they really dropped down the order, out of the points, and so they left the Chinese GP without points in the bag.

-McLaren:
China was also a big let down for McLaren. No McLaren in Q3 for the first time this season and both Lando and Carlos involved in an incident with Daniil Kvyat, resulting in big time loss and a race to forget for the team. That was a shame, although I did not expect them to score any points this weekend after their disappointing qualifying.

-Ferrari's management:
How must Charles Leclerc feel after all that happened during the race? He was ordered to let Sebastian Vettel by, who wasn't that much faster, and having to stay out to slow down Valtteri Bottas for Vettel. I do understand it in a way, Vettel is the more experienced of the 2 drivers, but Charles has impressed a lot more throughout the first 3 events, whereas Vettel just hasn't. Lost his podium finish in Australia to Max Verstappen, did a lot of pain to his race in Bahrain by spinning and with that eventually damaging his front wing. The team order felt so awkward, as Charles told the team he was about to pull away. If Sebastian has a few more incidents early on in the season, I'd say it's wise to support Leclerc in a possible bid for the World Championship. Sebastian has shown last year he isn't capable of handling the pressure of a title bid, having quite a few incidents whereas I can't recall that many of Hamilton, if any.