Russell takes dominant Chinese GP sprint pole

George Russell led team-mate Kimi Antonelli as Mercedes dominated qualifying for the sprint race at the Chinese Grand Prix.

Russell was 0.289 seconds clear of the Italian and a massive 0.621secs ahead of the first non-Mercedes, world champion Lando Norris in the McLaren.

Lewis Hamilton was fourth for Ferrari, just 0.02secs slower than Norris, while McLaren’s Oscar Piastri took fifth ahead of the second Ferrari of Charles Leclerc.

Red Bull’s Max Verstappen could manage only eighth place, 1.734secs off the pace and behind the Alpine of Pierre Gasly.

Haas’ Oliver Bearman was ninth ahead of the second Red Bull of Isack Hadjar.

Russell’s pole was his second in six days after he took pole and win in the season-opening race in Australia.

And the qualifying session followed a very similar pattern to Melbourne – Russell about 0.3secs quicker than Antonelli and the quickest Ferrari a similar chunk further behind.

Russell said: “The car has been really great all day and the engine is performing more normal compared to Melbourne when you had these big de-rates (when the engine switches to energy-recovery mode) and it was a bit challenging to drive. The focus since Melbourne has been about improving the starts.”

Norris, who had a difficult race in Melbourne, said: “I’m happy with the result. P3 is as good as we can do for the time being, pretty happy to beat both Ferraris. A good lap and puts me in a good position for tomorrow.”

Hamilton, who had spun in practice earlier in the day, added: “Really pleased with the session. P1 was a tricky session with a spin.

“We are losing a lot of time on the straights, we have a lot of work to do to improve on power.

“Mercedes have done a fantastic job and we have to step up and push to close the gap. Car-wise the car feels great and we can compete in the corners but when you’re down on power it is the way it is.”

In Australia, the Ferrari was much more competitive in the race, in which Leclerc leapt into the lead from fourth place on the grid at the start.

Leclerc said he had lost 0.5secs on the back straight on his final run – more than the gap between himself and Hamilton.

“In qualifying for some reason the Mercedes power-unit finds a lot of lap time,” he said, “but in the race we are much closer.”

The big outliers were Red Bull. Hadjar qualified third in Australia but both cars were way off the pace in Shanghai.

Verstappen, who crashed on his first lap in Australia after his rear brakes locked at the first corner, did at least complete a session and was nearly 0.5secs ahead of his team-mate.

But that will be no consolation for the four-time champion when the gap to the front is so large.

At the back, troubled Williams and Aston Martin teams continued to struggle.

The lead Williams of Carlos Sainz was 17th fastest, 1.7secs off the pace. He was more than 0.5secs ahead of team-mate Alex Albon, who made an error and ran wide on his second lap.

Fernando Alonso put the Aston Martin 19th, 2.5secs off the pace but nearly 0.6secs quicker than team-mate Lance Stroll.

Williams are battling with an overweight car, while Aston Martin’s main issue is the Honda engine’s lack of performance and reliability.

On the positive side for Aston Martin, they have had no reliability issues so far in China after finding a way to isolate the batteries from the engine vibration that had caused so many problems in pre-season testing and restricted miles in Australia.

1. George Russell (Mercedes) – 1:31.520

2. Kimi Antonelli (Mercedes) +0.289

3. Lando Norris (McLaren) +0.621

4. Lewis Hamilton (Ferrari) +0.641

5. Oscar Piastri (McLaren) +0.704

6. Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) +1.008

7. Pierre Gasly (Alpine) +1.368

8. Max Verstappen (Red Bull) +1.734

9. Oliver Bearman (Haas) +1.889

10. Isack Hadjar (Red Bull) +2.203