The Chinese Grand Prix 2013 was the 3rd round of the 2013 F1 season, and took place at the Shanghai International Circuit in Shanghai, China, on April 14th.
Fernando Alonso won the race after starting in the 3rd position, followed by Kimi Räikkönen, and Lewis Hamilton, who originally had the pole position, completing the podium.
Final results
Race evolution
Pit Stops
There were a total of 57 pit stops during the race.
The most popular pit stop windows were:
- Laps 4-7: 12 stops
- Laps 14-17: 8 stops
- Laps 19-21: 7 stops
- Laps 23-24: 6 stops
- Laps 31-34: 8 stops
- Laps 36-39: 8 stops
The fastest pit stop was Sebastian Vettel's, stopping the clock at 19.323 seconds during his pit stop on lap 14, while the slowest one was was Mark Webber's, who stopped the clock at 26.956 seconds, 7.633 seconds slower than Vettel, during his pit stop on lap 15.
These times include the time the driver spent going through the pit lane, as well as the actual time he stopped for the mechanics to work on his car.
Strategy
We saw a variety of options in terms of pit stop strategies during this race, however most drivers chose a 3 stops. Only Mark Webber, Jenson Button and Sergio Pérez decided to try something different with a 2 stops strategy.
The race winner, Fernando Alonso, was on a 3 stops strategy.
2 stops
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2Mark Webber
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3Jenson Button
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1Sergio Pérez
3 stops
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-Daniel Ricciardo
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2Lewis Hamilton
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15Nico Rosberg
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4Charles Pic
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2Fernando Alonso
-
-Kimi Räikkönen
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3Jules Bianchi
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3Giedo van der Garde
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1Felipe Massa
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3Romain Grosjean
-
-Pastor Maldonado
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2Max Chilton
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-Nico Hülkenberg
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5Sebastian Vettel
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3Paul di Resta
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3Jean-Éric Vergne
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3Valtteri Bottas
Excluding those drivers who could not finish the race, those on a 2 stops strategy gained 2 positions on average, while those on a 3 stops strategy gained 1.38 positions on average.
Despite of the average possitons gained or lost, and considering a deeper analysis of the performance of each strategy, we consider the 3 stops strategy as the optimal for this race.
It is important to note that this might not always be the case for other races held at the Shanghai International Circuit, as the conditions might change from year to year, in terms of wheel degradation, accidents, safety cars, etc.
Incidents
There race went on mostly with no incidents. Only 4 divers were involved in circumstances that were severe enough to prevented them from finishing the race.
These included, Nico Rosberg, who suffered a suspension problem on lap 21, Mark Webber, who had a wheel problem on lap 15, and Adrian Sutil, and Esteban Gutiérrez, both retired dure to damage caused by a collision with other cars.
Suspension
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Nico RosbergLap 21
Wheel
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Mark WebberLap 15
Collision
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Adrian SutilLap 5
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Esteban GutiérrezLap 4
Qualifying
Lewis Hamilton dominated all the qualifying sessions and took the pole by 0.277 seconds, with a final lap time of 1:34.484. Right next to him, completing the first line of the grid, was Kimi Räikkönen.
Track evolution
As the qualifying session went on, with the track rubbering in, and the drivers testing the limits of the grip of their cars, the times per lap dropped, and 15 out of the 16 drivers that took place in Q2 were able to improve their times.
The Q3 is the time were all the remaining drivers put all their cards on the table, even those with a superior car who might have been managing their times in Q1 and Q2 push their cars to the limit in Q3. It therefore comes as no surprise that 7 out of the 8 drivers that took place in Q3 were able to improve their times.