Max Verstappen publicly blasted Red Bull’s RB22 as “undriveable” and a “disaster” after a troubled Friday at the Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai, saying “we never had anything this bad,” that the car was “horrendous” and suffered from “no grip, no balance.” He quipped he was “practicing with Mario Kart,” warned he was losing “massive amounts of time in the corners,” and said the new power-unit changes left him “conflicted” about his future. Verstappen ultimately qualified eighth for the sprint, about 1.7–1.8 seconds off George Russell’s sprint pole, and described driveability problems that compounded through the day.

The on-track data and session details underscored those complaints: Verstappen slid from 11th in SQ1 to eighth in SQ3 as his deficit to Russell widened from around 1.140s in SQ1 to about 1.734s in the final shootout, and he had an off at the last corner during SQ2. Rookie teammate Isack Hadjar scraped into SQ3 and qualified 10th, roughly half a second behind Verstappen after a compromised SQ3 lap blamed on a battery deployment issue. Mercedes produced a dominant sprint qualifying performance, leaving Red Bull unusually exposed under the new 2026 regulations.

Technical analysis and team reaction amplified the concern. Sky Sports’ Anthony Davidson flagged a clear “torque spike” on onboard audio that preceded an oversteer moment and warned the unpredictable power delivery forced Verstappen to drive defensively; commentators judged the faults to be fundamental and unlikely to have “quick fixes.” Red Bull’s Laurent Mekies was heard apologizing on the radio (“Sorry, Max”) and said there was “a lot to learn,” pointing to the new power unit and race-trim energy management as key areas to understand. The team has acknowledged it has fallen further off the pace of Mercedes, Helmut Marko cautioned that Verstappen would not win the 2026 title even as Red Bull begins racing its own power unit, and engineers face a difficult puzzle to close the gap before the Sprint and the race.

An unexplained Ferrari power-unit deployment problem cost Charles Leclerc straight-line speed and effectively ruined his Sprint qualifying in Shanghai, leaving him sixth on the Sprint grid. Leclerc radioed the team during SQ3 — “This deployment, my god,” and “What the hell is happening?” — and said he lost “around four tenths” on the back straight and “about half a second” on his second SQ3 lap.

Team figures varied slightly on the magnitude of the loss — Frédéric Vasseur said Leclerc “lost something like three tenths in the last straight line” — but the net result was a heavily compromised one-lap time: Leclerc was more than three tenths down on Lewis Hamilton and roughly a second adrift of George Russell, who set the SQ3 benchmark.

Ferrari acknowledged the deployment issue and said it would analyze the data to determine whether the problem could be resolved or managed for the Sprint and the main race. The car’s situation in Shanghai highlighted a contrast between strong cornering and weak straight-line punch: Ferrari had briefly trialed a distinctive “Macarena” rear wing in FP1 before withdrawing it, a change that reportedly improved corner performance but exacerbated the deficit on the straights. Mercedes’ qualifying edge was clear — Hamilton and Russell topped the timesheets and rivals warned Ferrari must urgently close the power shortfall — yet Leclerc and the team said they remained confident they could be relatively stronger in race trim and hoped to recover during the races.

FIA stewards opened post-session investigations into alleged impeding by Mercedes rookie Kimi Antonelli and Alpine’s Pierre Gasly during Sprint qualifying at the Chinese Grand Prix, actions that could carry three-place grid drops and threaten to undo Mercedes’ provisional front-row lockout. The summonses mean the Sprint starting order set in qualifying is provisional and could be reshuffled before Saturday’s Sprint race, with the stewards’ decision likely to have direct consequences for the top five.

Officials were told Antonelli appeared to impede Lando Norris late in SQ2, with Norris saying on the radio he “was going to push that lap” after backing out when Antonelli was reportedly slow on the inside into Turn 1, while Max Verstappen accused Gasly of impeding him after Turn 14 and forcing him wide on his final push. Both drivers were called before the stewards; the FIA said it would probe the drivers’ actions themselves rather than simply the resulting track positions. Despite the alleged incidents, Norris and Verstappen both progressed to SQ3.

Provisional results see George Russell on Sprint pole after a 1:31.520 lap with teammate Antonelli second, giving Mercedes a provisional 1-2. If Antonelli is penalized three places he would drop down the order — one widely reported scenario would see him fall to fifth, promote Norris onto the front row and bump Verstappen up from P8 — producing a significant reshuffle of the Sprint grid. The session also underlined wider issues in the field: Sergio Pérez missed the session with a fuel-system problem and Red Bull reported drivability and balance troubles, Verstappen calling the RB22 “horrendous,” leaving the stewards’ forthcoming ruling as the key determinant of the final Sprint grid.

Mercedes stamped its authority on the solitary practice hour at the Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai. George Russell set the outright pace in FP1 with a 1:32.741, and teammate Kimi Antonelli was 0.120s adrift to complete a Mercedes 1-2. The one-hour session — the only practice before sprint qualifying under Shanghai’s compact schedule — left Mercedes more than half a second clear of the nearest challengers on the timing screen.

McLaren and Ferrari were the closest rivals in the limited running: Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri posted the best non-Mercedes times, around 0.56s and 0.73s back respectively, while Charles Leclerc also featured among the early challengers. Teams used the hour for short-run tire work and setup experiments — notably Ferrari introduced a new ‘macarena’ rear wing, which could reduce Mercedes’ straight-line advantage if it proves effective.

Lewis Hamilton briefly ran the ‘macarena’ wing and soft tires during the session but remained well off Russell’s medium-tire benchmark. The session also produced several incidents and reliability concerns teams must address: Hamilton and Norris made contact during an overtaking attempt, with Hamilton spinning and heavily flat-spotting his tires; Franco Colapinto and Oliver Bearman also spun; Arvid Lindblad stopped with smoke; and Carlos Sainz missed much of the hour with a data issue.

Red Bull appeared off the pace in FP1, with Max Verstappen and Isack Hadjar running outside the top spots, reinforcing the picture of a weekend in which Mercedes remained the team to beat and others must use sparse track time to try to close the gap.

Mercedes held a clear performance advantage over Ferrari going into the Chinese Grand Prix, driven largely by active-aero/straight-mode and differences in energy and engine deployment. Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc both said Mercedes showed a distinct edge after the Australian Grand Prix, with Hamilton putting the qualifying gap at about eight tenths and the race-trim deficit at four to five tenths; in another report he described Ferrari as roughly half a second per lap slower in race trim.

Observers attributed much of Mercedes’ edge to the W17’s straight-mode performance and how that system lets Mercedes deploy energy more effectively on flying laps, making their cars harder to clip on the straights. Formula 1 confirmed straight mode will be enabled at several sector pairs in Shanghai, and Hamilton urged Ferrari to work out how Mercedes achieved the “huge step.” George Russell’s dominant weekend in Melbourne — converting pole into victory after a near-0.8s pole advantage over non-Mercedes cars — underlined the gap.

George Russell publicly accused Ferrari of blocking the FIA from changing Formula 1’s start procedure ahead of the Chinese Grand Prix, calling the team ‘selfish’ and ‘a bit silly.’

He tied the dispute to start problems at the season-opening Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne, saying low battery levels on the formation lap—caused by the harvest-limit rule—had disadvantaged cars that qualified in the front half. Russell said the FIA wanted to remove the harvest limit to prevent repeats but could not implement the change because it required a super-majority of teams and Ferrari opposed it.

He noted that some Ferrari drivers had managed strong starts under the current procedure, and Lewis Hamilton described the revised start procedure as ‘exciting’ and expected it to improve as the sport transitions to the broader 2026 power-unit and chassis changes.

Ferrari will debut a radical rear wing—nicknamed the Macarena (also called the flip-flop wing)—on the SF‑26 at the Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai as part of an early-season technical development arms race. Team principal Fred Vasseur says the upgrade is part of an aggressive development program, and the team plans an evolved rear-wing specification by the Canadian Grand Prix in May; reports indicated three different specifications of the Macarena were sent to Shanghai for the sprint weekend.

Video from pre-season testing in Bahrain showed the wing’s top element rotating a full 180 degrees, effectively turning the flap upside down to reduce drag. Ferrari first ran the device on the penultimate day of testing with limited mileage and chose not to use it at the season-opening Australian Grand Prix. In Shanghai the wing was positioned to operate along the circuit’s 1.1 km straight.

Rivals and Ferrari personnel framed the rollout as part of a rapid development battle. Lewis Hamilton said Ferrari ran the device “a full day or so” in Bahrain, praised Ferrari’s engineers for accelerating upgrades, and said he was keen to see its impact in China while warning the title fight will be decided by an ongoing “development war.” Hamilton also noted qualifying gaps of roughly eight tenths and race deficits of four to five tenths to Mercedes after Ferrari finished third and fourth in Melbourne following a pit-stop strategy blunder that likely cost a probable win. Others, including Lando Norris, have highlighted Ferrari’s strong cornering pace, and Ferrari has introduced other upgrades this season—including a smaller turbo intended to help race starts—as teams escalate technical development early in the season.

McLaren conceded after the Australian Grand Prix that the team is “nowhere near” the front. Lando Norris said there was “zero chance at the minute” of matching the top teams, estimating McLaren were roughly 0.5-0.6 seconds per lap off the pace. He singled out Ferrari as having “the best car” with “unbelievable” cornering, pointed to Red Bull’s pace when Max Verstappen nearly caught him, and warned the team faces a long, tough season unless it closes the gap quickly.

Team data and commentary pointed to a complex package shortfall rather than a single cause. McLaren team principal Andrea Stella said the team was “a little puzzled,” noting losses both on the straights and through certain corners and describing a performance gap of roughly 0.5-1.0 seconds that mirrored the near one-second qualifying deficit to George Russell. GPS analysis and team data highlighted straight-line time loss despite McLaren and Mercedes using the same power unit, and Stella added that limited information from Mercedes about their new engine hampered McLaren’s understanding.

Severe front-tire graining after only a few laps compounded the problem, masking some pace and forcing two-stop strategies that left McLaren more than 50 seconds adrift of the winner. Most sources put Norris about 51-52 seconds behind Russell, though one report cited a 35.5-second gap. Outside analysts flagged the need for aero and package upgrades — Sky Sports’ Martin Brundle said McLaren “need an aero upgrade” — and Stella warned corrective upgrades will take a few races to arrive. The result was George Russell’s victory and a Mercedes 1-2 in Melbourne; Oscar Piastri, who had topped FP2 and shown early weekend pace, was unable to start after a reconnaissance-lap crash, leaving McLaren with only Norris to assess the deficit.

The F1 Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai (March 13–15) is the season’s first sprint weekend and the first of six sprint events. Key session times (Shanghai / UK): Friday practice 11:30 / 03:30; sprint qualifying 15:30 / 07:30; Saturday sprint 11:00 / 03:00; Saturday qualifying 15:00 / 07:00; Sunday Grand Prix 15:00 / 07:00.

Teams will have only a single hour of practice before sprint qualifying under the sprint format, producing a compressed schedule for teams and drivers.

U.K. viewers will be able to watch every session live on Sky Sports F1 (streamable via Sky Go; subscriptions from £22/month), with free highlights on Channel 4 and live text coverage on Crash.net.