If you were writing scripts for the new Formula 1 season, there’s a front row you probably would have wanted to put together early in the year: Lewis Hamilton on pole ahead of Max Verstappen.
And it might only be for a Sprint race, but that is the prospect that lies ahead at the Chinese Grand Prix.
What’s so tantalizing is the fact that we’re seeing early fluctuations in form for all teams. McLaren looked comfortably quickest throughout Friday until it mattered at the end of SQ3, and then couldn’t get a car on the front row. Oscar Piastri was close, and Lando Norris could have been there if he finished his lap cleanly, but the peakiness of the car is one reason he failed to do so.
So, taking every opportunity to get points on the board in this early stage of the year when the McLaren appears to have an advantage is going to be crucial — and both Hamilton and Verstappen have a chance of doing so on Saturday morning.
What’s more, they also could be helped by the other acting as a bit of a rear gunner. Neither will want to play that role, but both will believe they have a quick enough car to win the Sprint race if they are running in the lead. If they hold position off the line, then Verstappen is not going to be an easy pass for either Piastri or Norris. Similarly, Hamilton won’t just wave the McLarens through, either.
Yet you don’t need to go back very far to get the feeling that this wasn’t on the cards.
“I’m just a bit gobsmacked, honestly — I’m a bit taken back by it,” Hamilton said. “I didn’t know when we would get to this position after last weekend; it was a difficult start to the week. I came here with aggression and wanting to really get the car into a great place, and I started out straight away with a better feeling in the car.
“I just I can’t believe that we’re at the front end ahead of a McLaren, which has been so fast through throughout winter testing, and obviously in the last race and even today. But I’m really grateful just to be up there fighting with these great drivers and to be so close to these other teams.”
Ferrari did not get its setup right in Australia and was never truly competitive in the sessions that mattered at Albert Park. McLaren said it was surprised, and so did Mercedes team principal Toto Wolff. But the evidence was of a messy and disorganized team that did not tally with the more recent Ferrari standards.
Strategy calls didn’t pay off in the changing conditions, and just five points were taken from Sunday’s race. The fallout was a focus on the long road being faced by Hamilton and the team to really jell, especially if other aspects were not going to be operating at 100%.
But while Norris arrived in China telling people to “calm down” about the fast start McLaren has made, so too Hamilton was delivering a similar message against being too harsh on Ferrari so far. For one, his radio exchanges with race engineer Riccardo Adami were being used to highlight how much work still needed doing, yet the 40-year-old felt it unfairly overlooked how well they had worked together in such a short space of time.
It’s also true that Hamilton’s comments were in contrast to how some other drivers have treated race engineers in the past — as he was pointedly being very polite in his feedback and requests — but the fact they were being picked up on were not wrong.
That said, Hamilton himself admitted after taking Sprint pole that the previous race had been “a disaster” and, not that the radio messages should be used critically, but they do provide a clear example of the sort of challenges that Hamilton himself has been warning about so far this year. There’s plenty of experience that needs to be gained from both sides about how to get the best out of each other, and most of that will play out in the public domain.
Hamilton never completed a race simulation in pre-season testing, for example, and then his first such running in Australia was in extremely tricky conditions that caught out so many drivers and teams. It was extremely easy to make mistakes both behind the wheel and from the pit wall.
The additional focus on that aspect could well be because that is where Hamilton is expected to be strongest. Ask any driver or former driver in the paddock and they will talk up the pace potential that Charles Leclerc has over one lap, and more often than not there were predictions that Hamilton would struggle to match his teammate in qualifying but be a bigger threat in races.
So for Hamilton and Ferrari to respond to the difficulties in Australia within just five days, put that learning into practice over a solitary hour of FP1 in Shanghai and then deliver Sprint pole — again when it was clearly not easy to prepare the tires and work out what the right approach was — is a major surprise.
I don’t mind admitting that I would have predicted it would be rare that Hamilton would pick up pole positions this season, not only because I didn’t see Ferrari having the outright fastest car, but also because of Leclerc’s ability on the occasions the car would be good enough. For him to set the pace in only his second qualifying session was not on my bingo card.
This could be a short-lived high, depending on how the Sprint pans out and with another qualifying session to follow on Saturday afternoon that will provide an opportunity for McLaren in particular to learn from its errors. But after catching us by surprise today, don’t rule out the seven-time world champion making further gains, either.
“Wow, holy crap, my first [with Ferrari],” he said. “Even though it’s not the main pole, that gives me real inspiration to go into tomorrow to find more performance and see if we can compete again.”
It’s certainly a glimpse of the potential that Hamilton has at Ferrari, and it’s that first piece of evidence that will just make you believe that the partnership could deliver something thrilling.