2012 Chinese Grand Prix

Overcast but Dry [ 1 ] Air Temp 22 °C (72 °F) [ 1 ]

The 2012 Chinese Grand Prix (formally the 2012 Formula 1 UBS Chinese Grand Prix ) [ 2 ] was a Formula One motor race held on 15 April 2012 at the Shanghai International Circuit in Shanghai , China . [ 3 ] It was the ninth running of the Chinese Grand Prix as a round of the Formula One World Championship. The 56-lap race was the third round of the 2012 Formula One season .

After extended debate over the legality of the Mercedes F1 W03 's "front wing F-duct" design in Australia and Malaysia , [ 7 ] [ 8 ] that ended with the FIA declaring the design to be legal, [ 7 ] [ 9 ] Red Bull Racing team principal Christian Horner stated that his team was still seeking clarification on the matter, which he expected to be resolved in Shanghai, [ 10 ] despite having previously sought a "final ruling" in Malaysia. [ 11 ] On the Thursday before the race, Lotus F1 filed a formal p...

The FIA confirmed that the Drag Reduction System (DRS) zone will be unchanged from 2011 , with the detection point located at Turn 12 and the activation point positioned along the back straight. [ 16 ]

Like the Australian Grand Prix, tyre supplier Pirelli brought its white-banded medium compound tyre as the harder "prime" tyre and the yellow-banded soft compound tyre as the softer "option" tyre, whereas in 2011, the "prime" compound was the silver-banded hard compound tyre. [ 17 ]

The first session begun with Force India driver Paul di Resta posting the first timed lap of the session. Other drivers followed soon after; all on the harder medium 'prime' tyre. The difference between the medium and the soft compounds was predicted around 0.8 seconds per lap. Leaving their run late, eight minutes into the session both the Red Bull and Mercedes cars had yet to post timed laps. Sebastian Vettel 's engineer was heard saying that the lap time he did of 1:36.9 would be good enough ...

For the second session, the two Saubers and Kimi Räikkönen were first to set timed laps. Romain Grosjean was late to post a lap as he made a mistake on his first attempt and pitted for a new set of option tyres. Vettel, in 6th midway through the session, was told on the radio that his current time would probably not make it into Q3. With less than 2 minutes remaining only the Mercedes (P1 and P2), Lewis Hamilton (P3) and Räikkönen (P4) remained in the pits, while everyone else scrambled to get i...

For the final session, the track was cooling down and German Nico Rosberg was told to think about that in his warm up lap. He was the first to set a timed lap early on with six minutes remaining in the session. The top speed of his car down the long back straight was only 314 km/h as he hit the 7th gear rev-limiter meaning that Mercedes cars didn't have the highest top speed but rather made up time through a better acceleration through the f-duct system as he was one of the quickest past the sta...

Michael Schumacher was forced to retire after a miscommunication resulted in him leaving the pit lane before his right front wheel was properly fitted. [ 19 ] The wheel-gun man knew he made an error and immediately tried to call Schumacher back, but it was too late. He was subsequently the only retirement of the race, leaving Mercedes to ponder what could have been at least a podium finish. On lap 14, pole sitter and leader Rosberg pitted for mediums tyres leaving an unpitted Pérez in the lead.

Following the pit stops, Nico Rosberg once again emerged as the leader, followed by Jenson Button, Lewis Hamilton, Mark Webber, and Kimi Räikkönen. Lap 21 saw everyone in their adjusted positions after everyone had completed one pit stop. On lap 22, Webber stopped for fresh medium tyres, and set a new fastest lap upon emerging. Button and Hamilton followed suit soon after. Räikkönen pitted from 2nd on lap 29, dropping him down to 13th. At this stage of the race, Jenson Button had great pace and ...

Rosberg, having continued running on his hard tyres for 21 laps, finally decided to pit on lap 34 for his second and final stop - meaning he would need 22 laps from this set of medium tyres. This allowed Button to take the lead, followed by Rosberg and Hamilton, who was closely pressed by Alonso for third. At this stage of the race, a 'train' of cars started to form (seen clearly down the back straight). From Massa in 5th, who had only stopped once, the next three cars all had their DRS open, me...

The train continued to grow by lap 38 as Grosjean in 10th joined Massa, Räikkönen, Kobayshi, and Vettel in the battle for 5th. Jenson Button asked his engineer "what time is Rosberg doing?", to which his engineer replied "Rosberg is seven-tenths slower than us". However, this was before Rosberg pitted for new tyres, and now Rosberg was six-tenths a lap up on Button.

Lap 38 saw Hamilton pit from 3rd, closely followed in by Alonso, dropping them to 10th and 11th respectively. Button's final pit stop while 7 seconds ahead, on lap 39, was delayed due to an error on the left rear wheel and allowed Rosberg back into the lead. Following Button's pit stop, Rosberg now led Massa by 19.1 seconds in clear command and within sight of victory as highlighted by his engineer saying "most important thing is your looking after the tyres". Finally Massa pitted from second pl...