How Ferrari's key weaknesses were exposed in China

Lewis Hamilton's victory ahead of Valtteri Bottas in the Chinese Grand Prix means Mercedes has started what should be its most challenging season in years with a hat-trick of one-twos. But Formula 1's 1000th race wasn't just about the Silver Arrows dominating, it also cruelly exposed three key weaknesses for a chastened Ferrari team.

Firstly, Ferrari was not fast enough in China, even with its straightline speed advantage carrying over from Bahrain. Secondly, Ferrari was indecisive in how it managed its drivers and should have either ordered Sebastian Vettel past Charles Leclerc earlier or let the battle between the pair play out rather than doing a bit of both. Thirdly, its strategy with Leclerc was questionable, ultimately costing him any chance of beating Max Verstappen to fourth place.

Ferrari's pace in Bahrain had raised hopes for the team but, with Mercedes convinced it had run a little too much wing and therefore drag there, things were back to what we now must consider normal in China. The best of the Ferraris was three tenths of a second down in qualifying as Bottas and Hamilton locked out the front row.

Just as in Australia, the start was decisive in the intra-Mercedes battle and went in favour of the driver in second place. Bottas's launch was reasonable enough but he picked up wheelspin as he crossed the white line at the front of the grid. That was enough to cause a slight hesitation in the build-up of speed and allowed Hamilton, who had laid down plenty of rubber at the start of the formation lap, to take the lead well before they got to Turn 1.

"Lewis had a better start and for me, the problem was already [clear] on the formation lap start," said Bottas.

"There was a thick white line just in front of my grid box, so when you're still accelerating, and when I went over the white line I got some wheelspin on the formation lap start. For the race start, I thought maybe it's going to be better with warmer tyres but it wasn't, so once I hit the white line, I got the wheelspin, took too long to recover it, lost a few metres of distance, so Lewis got me."

Hamilton had two seconds in the bag by the end of the first lap. With both drivers on the medium Pirellis having used them to set their times in Q2, like all of the top five, Bottas halved the gap on the second lap to 1.047s.

From lap three to lap 20, Hamilton eked an average of 0.248s out over Bottas to build a lead of 5.516s. But the real story during this phase of the race was behind them. Vettel had the edge over Leclerc throughout the weekend, even though ultimately the pair were only separated by 17 thousandths in qualifying. And given Leclerc's lengthy self-beration over the radio after completing his lap, it was clear he believed he had it in him to be ahead.

Bottas's start gave him that opportunity, as it led to Vettel placing his Ferrari on the outside line into Turn 1 in the hope of attacking Bottas. He couldn't, and Leclerc on the inside was able to get ahead - comfortably securing third place by the time they entered Turn 2.

Vettel was adamant he was quicker than Leclerc, and after 10 laps the gap to Bottas had grown to 3.715s - with Hamilton nearly seven seconds up the road. Vettel couldn't launch an attack but with both drivers being urged to push over the radio it was clear a swap was on the cards, as Leclerc was told you "need to go faster otherwise we'll let Sebastian past".

Leclerc, as you'd expect, wasn't delighted with this and started to take issue before reining himself in. In the end, having been given the instruction to cede position, he did as he was told and let Vettel past into Turn 1 on lap 11 of the 56.

The Ferrari switcheroo allowed fifth-placed Verstappen to close a little. Verstappen could have started ahead of the two Ferraris on the grid had he, along with Red Bull team-mate Pierre Gasly and both Haas drivers, not failed to start the final Q3 lap before the chequered flag thanks to getting stuck in the preparation-lap traffic. He was 2.7s behind the pair before the changeover, but the gap immediately closed to two seconds when the Ferraris swapped.

Once ahead, Vettel did not initially pull away from Leclerc. In fact, he struggled a little and lost half a second to his team-mate when he locked up and ran wide at the hairpin.

"We are losing quite a lot of time," said Leclerc over the radio. "I don't know if you want to know or not, but I'm letting you know."

Conventional wisdom has it Leclerc should have pitted by this time. Instead, he extended his stint

With the stint well-advanced by the time he was ahead, Vettel dived into the pits at the end of lap 18 when only 2.070s clear of Leclerc. This was in response to Verstappen stopping for hard Pirellis a lap earlier. Verstappen had closed to 1.266s behind Leclerc - and 2.827s behind Vettel - when he pitted at the end of lap 17, so both Ferraris were vulnerable to the undercut.

Vettel was called in first and emerged with Verstappen bearing down on him after a good out-lap on which he efficiently dispatched both Sergio Perez's Racing Point and Daniel Ricciardo's Renault.

Verstappen attacked on the entry to the hairpin, braking ultra-late and diving up the inside. Vettel left him space, cutting back to the inside and repassing the Red Bull - hanging him out to dry and forcing Verstappen to take a bite of the grass on the run out of the corner. Verstappen considered attacking into the final corner, but thought better, eased off and peeled back in behind Vettel.

Threat averted, hard-shod Vettel was able to consolidate his advantage over Verstappen and inch away again. Mercedes, meanwhile, was able to pick its moment and extended its first stint slightly. Bottas was called in first, at the end of lap 21, with Hamilton following a lap later. The reversal of the usual leader-first order was to ensure Bottas didn't lose too much time to Vettel's undercut, but he rejoined with almost five seconds in hand.

Conventional wisdom has it Leclerc should have pitted by this time. Had he stopped a lap after Vettel, he would have lost fourth place to Verstappen but would at least have been close. Instead, he was told to extend his stint. He did, to the end of lap 22.

That means his stint was four laps longer than Vettel's, and at least three laps longer than it needed to be. From laps 19-21, Leclerc lost 2.5s per lap to Verstappen. On his in-lap, he shed almost three seconds. So when he emerged from the pits, Leclerc was just over 11 seconds behind, and with only the advantage of hard tyres that were five laps younger.

With Verstappen now three seconds behind Vettel, the real battle was the one for fourth and fifth. Leclerc was told to push. Over the next 10 laps, Leclerc was 0.743s per lap faster than Verstappen and started the 34th lap 3.4s behind. But thanks to an inspired Red Bull strategy call that had a big impact on the race by ensuring the other leaders also had to commit to a two-stopper when a one-stopper was still possible, what followed was Verstappen's in-lap.

"We triggered the two stops for everybody else," said Red Bull team principal Christian Horner. "Our rationale was that, pretty early on, we decided that the most upside we might have was in the event of a two-stop race, particularly if there had been a safety car around and others elected to stay on one.

"This then sparked some discussion between Sebastian and his pitwall as to whether or not they were going to stop at all, but in the end they covered us, and Mercedes had to cover him. And Leclerc got hung out to dry."

Leclerc took mediums for the final stint. With 14 laps to go, he was 15s behind Verstappen at the first corner. But that gap was only down to 14.695s by the end of the lap, leaving him an almost impossible task

Verstappen stopped at the end of lap 34, followed by Vettel a lap later. As the lead Ferrari was within 14s of Hamilton, the risk of getting caught by a car on fresher rubber by the finish 22 laps later was too great. To avoid losing any unnecessary time to the undercut with either car, Mercedes decided to double stack its cars. While there was 5.5s between the two, it was still a pressure point.

"We wanted to make sure that Valtteri and Lewis didn't lose out in pitting," said Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff. "It's an extremely tricky manoeuvre, you don't get to train that a lot. The first line of attack needs to be out of the way for the second group to put the tyres on. How it functioned today, I can only take my hat off to the mechanics and everyone involved."

When it all shook out, the spread of the leading cars had narrowed. The Mercedes were still safe, but Vettel had closed to within 10s of the lead. He wasn't close enough to threaten Bottas, but it showed Mercedes was justified in pitting its two cars simultaneously.

But there was one odd man out among the leaders: Leclerc. He found himself a strategic outlier and running second on the road, only a few seconds behind Hamilton. With a tyre and car pace disadvantage, he was inevitably going to fall away from the leader and he was soon passed by Bottas after a spirited defence. For the second time in the race, he was told to let Vettel past just before making his second stop on lap 42.

This time, Ferrari was justified in leaving Leclerc to run long either in the hope of making a one-stopper work or to build a significant tyre offset that might give him the chance to catch and pass Verstappen. On top of that, there was forlorn hope that he might hold up Bottas and allow Vettel to get into the fight for second.

Gasly stealing the bonus point for fastest lap at the death was the final nail in the coffin for Ferrari on a difficult weekend

"We stayed out because we tried to understand the tyre wear and if he could have concluded the race on one stop," said Ferrari team principal Mattia Binotto. "One stop could have been his better chance to recover some positions. We recognised it was safer to come in."

Like the rest of the frontrunners, Leclerc fitted mediums for the final stint. He emerged, with 14 laps remaining, 15s behind Verstappen as he navigated the first corner. That gap only came down to 14.695s by the end of the lap and Leclerc faced an almost impossible task. Over the final 13 laps, Leclerc was the fastest man on circuit but only 0.850s on average faster than Verstappen and fell 3.7s short in fifth place.

Behind them, Gasly's difficult weekend offered one consolation in the form of an opportunity to attack Vettel's fastest lap. He's still trying to get on top of how to get the best out of the Red Bull, citing in particular the corner exit phase - although he also appears to be struggling to get the car turned in as he would like.

The result was a lonely run to sixth place, but with a big gap back to the Renault of Ricciardo he could comfortably make a pitstop for a set of softs previously used in qualifying. With three laps remaining, he dived into the pits and attacked on his first flier. He successfully took fastest lap by 0.094s, although it was a little more calculated a mission than the narrow margin might suggest.

Asked if it had felt like a qualifying lap, Gasly replied: "Not so much. I had the delta time, I knew the target to do and it was a decent lap."

Losing that bonus point for fastest lap at the death was the final nail in the coffin for Ferrari on a difficult weekend. After the promise of pre-season testing, we've now seen enough even with the Bahrain anomaly to say Mercedes, which was effectively four days behind in testing having only introduced its 'real' 2019 car aero-wise at the second test, is definitively stronger - for now.

And for Hamilton personally, the weekend was something of a struggle even though he came out on top. But he worked sensibly and methodically and could have beaten Bottas to pole but for a poor final sector on his second, and slower, Q3 lap. His reward for crossing the line 6.5s clear of Bottas was, for the first time this season, the championship lead.

"We definitely didn't expect to have three one-twos, but now I'm proud to have been part of the work that everyone has done and to be a part of these results," said Hamilton. "[It has been] a little bit of a struggle this weekend for me, but once I got into qualifying, a little bit of a shift in driving style enabled me to unlock a bit more potential with the car. And then the start was obviously great, which was really the decisive moment I'd say for the race.

"After that it was fairly straightforward. I managed to have quite good pace today compared to practice two, long run pace, so I'm really, really happy with it. You can see it's still quite close with us all and I think it's just down to little small details of overall performance that's enabling us to come out with the results we're pulling."

Vettel, meanwhile, railed against some reports in the media when he was asked repeatedly after the race about team orders. He's right in that some of the reaction to Ferrari's willingness to use team orders - quite justified if the circumstances arise - has been misinterpreted in some quarters. But much more concerning to him will be that, on top of the slightly flat-footed approach to the early stages of the race, the car simply does not have the pace.

"As Mattia said we tried to do everything as a team," said Vettel. "Two weeks ago, Charles was faster. And it was quite straightforward and maybe a bit easier to pass in Bahrain. The upsetting thing after this race is we didn't manage to finish third and fourth. I want to be ahead of Charles, he wants to be ahead of me."

Building on the confidence of the previous five seasons, Mercedes has emphatically re-staked its claim as the era's pre-eminent team as the world championship enters its second 1000 races. The question is, can Ferrari hit back?