Liam Lawson qualified last for both races in Shanghai.
If there was any up-side to his tough two days in China, it was that the driver some claim Red Bull should have promoted instead of him was also out-qualified by his team mate – and a much less experienced one at that.
Here’s the key data from qualifying for the Chinese Grand Prix.
Change from practice to qualifying
As sprint race qualifying showed yesterday, Red Bull lapped far from their potential pace in the sole, one-hour qualifying session. But other teams failed to make as much of an improvement as they should have done between the two sessions.
Those teams, notably McLaren and Sauber, put that right today. McLaren got the pole position they should also have claimed for the sprint race and Nico Hulkenberg was on course to reach the top 10 until the final runs of Q3.
| Become a RaceFans supporter and
Gaps between team mates
After three qualifying sessions this year (two grand prix and one sprint race) Lawson has been the furthest behind his team mate in all of them. At half of the teams the drivers were separated by no more than 0.15 seconds, but Lawson was 0.75s off Verstappen.
At least he can point to the fact his benchmark is one of the best in the business and has a decade of experience. Hadjar, in his second grand prix on a track he hasn’t previously raced at, beat his much more experienced team mate Tsunoda.
| Become a RaceFans supporter and
Team mate battles sequences
Tsunoda arrived in China with the second-highest streak of out-qualifying his team mate of any driver. He was unbeaten in the previous nine grand prix qualifying sessions, through which time his team mates have been Daniel Ricciardo, Lawson and now Isack Hadjar.
Hadjar ended that today partly thanks to Tsunoda’s mistake at turn 13. However the rookie had been on Tsunoda’s pace up until that point, as yesterday’s data also showed.
Oscar Piastri also out-qualified Lando Norris for the first time in eight races. Lewis Hamilton beat his team mate for the first time in seven grands prix.
Fernando Alonso still has the best run of out-qualifying his team mate for grands prix, though Lance Stroll did beat him in sprint race qualifying this weekend.
| Driver | Consecutive qualifying wins |
|---|---|
| Fernando Alonso | 14 |
| Max Verstappen | 9 |
| George Russell | 8 |
| Pierre Gasly | 5 |
| Alexander Albon | 4 |
| Driver | Consecutive qualifying losses |
|---|---|
| Lance Stroll | 14 |
| Liam Lawson | 10 |
| Jack Doohan | 3 |
| Become a RaceFans supporter and
Q1/Q2/Q3 appearances
The most frequent visitors to Q3 kept their runs up this weekend, including George Russell, who has now reached the final round for 16 grands prix in a row. However despite reaching Q3 on his debut for Williams, Carlos Sainz Jnr’s four-race run ended today.
| Driver | Consecutive Q3 appearances |
|---|---|
| George Russell | 16 |
| Lando Norris | 9 |
| Oscar Piastri | 6 |
| Max Verstappen | 5 |
Go ad-free for just £1 per month
>> Find out more and sign up
Miss nothing from RaceFans
Get a daily email with all our latest stories – and nothing else. No marketing, no ads. Sign up here:
| Become a RaceFans supporter and
2025 Chinese Grand Prix
Browse all 2025 Chinese Grand Prix articles
