Russell won an interesting sprint ahead of the 2026 Chinese GP

George Russell won an interesting sprint before the 2026 Chinese GP, which featured many battles for the win and podium positions. In the closing stages, a neutralization bunched up the field, leading to further battles. The more sprints like this, the more fans will be convinced by this format.

Read more Qualifying analysis before the 2026 Chinese GP

The sprint was held in stable weather conditions, but it was very cold; the track temperature was in the teens (Celsius), which caused graining on the tires. At the end of the sprint, we had a full neutralization caused by Nico Hulkenberg, who stopped on the side of turn 1.

Sprint results before the 2026 Chinese GP

Summary and review of the sprint before the 2026 Chinese GP

The sprint provided a battle at the front due to reshuffling on the first lap. Hamilton took the lead and fought with Russell for several laps. Leclerc moved up to third, initially watching the battle ahead, and when Russell finally broke away (cleverly handling the overtake on Hamilton, which he finished by running him slightly wide to gain an advantage), he engaged in a battle with his teammate. The fight was interesting, and Leclerc eventually took second place – Hamilton had destroyed his tires in the opening laps.

Antonelli had a very poor start and dropped to eighth place. While making up positions, he hit Hadjar, for which he received a 10-second penalty. The Italian then drove excellently, systematically making up positions and moving up to second place. Just after this attack on Leclerc, a full neutralization occurred due to a failure in Hulkenberg’s car. Most drivers immediately pitted for soft tires. Antonelli served his 10-second penalty at the same time and dropped to seventh place. Hamilton dropped to fourth position behind Norris because Ferrari performed a double pit stop.

Russell handled the restart very well, broke away, and won the sprint. Behind him, Leclerc finished in second place. Hamilton overtook Norris to complete the podium. Antonelli and Piastri overtook Lawson and Bearman, who did not change tires during the neutralization.

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For the sprint, Bearman deserves credit for staying in the points-scoring positions throughout, as does Lawson, who gained a lot thanks to starting on hard tires. The sprint ended in a total failure for Red Bull, as they did not score any points. Verstappen had a very poor start, later made up ground, but not enough to score points. Hadjar started the sprint on soft tires, which proved to be a mistake, as he lost pace over the distance and eventually fell even behind Verstappen.

Summary

It was a successful sprint with a significant number of battles and overtakes. Most importantly, most of these battles took place at the very front. Hopefully, this is a good omen for the main Sunday race.

Six sprints are scheduled to take place in 2026. The current comparison of head-to-head battles in sprint qualifying and the sprints themselves can be checked at this link. It also includes a table of points scored this year solely in sprints.

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