Hamilton extends record winning streak with third grand slam

2017 Chinese Grand Prix stats and facts

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Lewis Hamilton’s 54th grand prix victory was also his third ‘grand slam’ of pole position, victory, fastest lap and leading every lap.

Making the result even more perfect, Hamilton set the fastest lap on his 44th tour, matching his car number. This was also the first time the race winner also set the fastest lap since last year’s Austrian Grand Prix, which was also won by Hamilton.

Only seven drivers in Formula One history have achieved this feat more than three times. One of them is the man who increasingly looks like being Hamilton’s main title rival this year, Sebastian Vettel.

His victory laps means he has extended his run of winning streak of taking at least one victory in each of the 11 season he has raced in.

Hamilton bagged his 63rd pole position on Saturday which leaves him three behind Ayrton Senna’s former record of 65. Though, as Hamilton acknowledged after qualifying, “he had a lot of pole positions with less races”. Hamilton is six behind all-time pole position king Michael Schumacher. This was Hamilton’s sixth pole position in a row, leaving him one shy of his personal best and two away from the record, which is held by Senna.

Hamilton was already the most successful driver in China and has added to his tallies, reaching six pole positions and five wins at the Shanghai track. But it’s probably still not enough to make up for that mistake in his first race here which arguably cost him the 2007 championship.

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He reached the podium for the 106th time on Sunday, equalling Alain Prost’s tally. He’s got a long way to go to equal Schumacher’s record of 155, however.

Who’s leading the championship? Officially they both are
By leading Vettel home in China, Hamilton drew level with his rival in the points standings. The last time we had a tie at the top of the championship was after the 2012 Spanish Grand Prix when Vettel and Fernando Alonso were on 61. Vettel went on to win that year’s championship.

What happens if they end the year still tied on points? The sporting regulations set out the procedure which will be followed:

7.1 Prizes and points awarded for all the positions of competitors who tie, will be added together and shared equally.
7.2 If two or more constructors or drivers finish the season with the same number of points, the higher place in the championship (in either case) shall be awarded to:
a) The holder of the greatest number of first places.
b) If the number of first places is the same, the holder of the greatest number of second places.
c) If the number of second places is the same, the holder of the greatest number of third places and so on until a winner emerges.
d) If this procedure fails to produce a result, the FIA will nominate the winner according to such criteria as it thinks fit.

Based on their current results there’s no way to separate them, but it’s very unlikely they’ll end the season with perfectly identical results. Not only has clause ‘d’ never been invoked before, we’ve never had a tie on points between two drivers at the top of the championship before at the end of an F1 season.

Webber went from Q1 to the podium in 2011
Mercedes marked their 150th race start with their 75th pole position – a strike rate of exactly 50% – and 65th race win. They prevented Ferrari from scoring their first back-to-back wins since 2010.

For the second race running cars from five different teams were eliminated in Q1. This time one of those drivers – Max Verstappen – went on to finish on the podium. This has only happened once before in Shanghai and it was also a Red Bull driver – Mark Webber six years ago.

Nico Hulkenberg took Renault into Q3 for the first time since the new owners took over the Lotus team at the end of 2015. The top four in Q3 lined up in the same order they did in Australia.

However a couple of mistakes during the race saw Hulkenberg pick up four penalty points. He and team mate Jolyon Palmer will have to tread carefully over the following rounds as both have at least half the penalty points needed to receive a one-race ban. Daniil Kvyat and Sebastian Vettel are in the same position:

Protocol error may come back to haunt Perez
Sergio Perez will have also need to take care over the rest of the season as he’s already picked up one reprimand in each of the first two races. One more will earn him a ten-place grid penalty.

Along with Ricciardo, Perez earned his reprimand yesterday for failing to show up at the national anthem ceremony. The stewards noted this was “not imposed for a driving infringement” but this can still count towards a grid penalty as only two of the three penalties must be for driving infringements.

If Perez does collect a third reprimand later in the year, his ten-place grid penalty will be due partly to his national anthem infraction.

Finally, Fernando Alonso’s run of Chinese Grand Prix finishes came to an end when he was forced to retire on Sunday. Prior to that he’d been classified in every race at Shanghai since 2004, and had only been lapped once.

Review the year so far in statistics here:

Have you spotted any other interesting stats and facts from the Chinese Grand Prix? Share them in the comments.

2017 Chinese Grand Prix

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Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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68 comments on “Hamilton extends record winning streak with third grand slam”

  1. This was only the second time a driver eliminated in Q1 went on to finish on the podium? Really? Somehow I thought there would have been more.

    Another question. Is there a stat about making up positions on a first lap? Is there a record of sorts?

    1. Fudge Kobayashi (@)
      10th April 2017, 14:05

      What about Lewis and his various car failures in qualifying in 2014 and 2016, surely that stat cant be correct?

      1. Raikkonen in Bahrain 2006
        Wurz in Canada 2007
        Grosjean in India 2013
        Hamilton in Germany and Hungary 2014, Belgium 2016

        Just a few I could think of. There may be more

        1. I think it’s referring to times when cars from 5 different teams were knocked out in Q1 and then one of those cars went on to finish on the podium.

          1. I think Keith is referring to when it has happened in Shanghai

          2. F Kobayashi (@)
            10th April 2017, 15:35

            @sumedhvidwans yes that makes sense, you’re right.

        2. I think Webber pulled it off once as well. In Malaysia 2011 I think. Not too sure

          1. China 2011 – 18th to 3rd

    2. I assumed it meant only the second time in happened in Shanghai because it doesn’t make sense otherwise.

    3. I think Winkelhock has that record for 2007 European GP. He went from last (22nd) to second as everyone but Kimj dived into the pits at the end of lap 1. He could have been 1st had Kimi not managed to slip out of the pit lane back on to the race track.

    4. @hahostolze Sorry that was messy – cleared it up a bit now.

      Is there a stat about making up positions on a first lap? Is there a record of sorts?

      I don’t know what the record is but I have got data on that for the past few seasons in the stats sections:

      https://www.racefans.net/2017-f1-season/statistics/race-data/#positionchangeonlapone

      1. @keithcollantine

        just had a look at stats….
        maybe an extra column for average track position would be useful?

    5. I think the stats are since Q1, Q2 and Q3 were introduced.

  2. Isn’t Perez on the best point finish sequence of anyone on the grid at the moment? 11/12 straight races in the points if I’m not mistaken?

    1. There’s always someone who is on the best point finish sequence, it may start to get mentioned when it’s approaching the record or at least high positions in that particular standing

      1. 12 points finishes in a row, and (AFAIK) the longest of any F1 driver ever.
        @johnmilk, @alfa145

        1. Don’t think so @f1-liners, Kimi had a better one which was around 30 ( don’t remember exactly). But Perez shouldn’t be far from the top, as it drops considerably from the second best to the others iirc

          1. thanks @johnmilk, Remco, @alfa145. My mistake.
            I incorrectly recalled the stats from last race, when Perez was longest active streak.

        2. Remco de Waal
          10th April 2017, 17:09

          It really isn’t:

          N° Nat Driver Points finishes GP
          1 fi Kimi Räikkönen 27 (2012-2013) Bahrain – Hungarian
          2 d Michael Schumacher 24 (2001-2003) Hungarian – Malaysian
          3 es Fernando Alonso 23 (2011-2012) European – Hungarian

        3. you clearly don’t remember the run of 27 races in the points held by Raikkonen while at Lotus

    2. I believe Perez currently holds the records for the most “Classified as finished” person. The last race he didn’t get a place in a race was in Hungary, 2015, meaning he has had a place finish for 2 + 21 + 9 = 32 races. Daniel Ricciardo was one behind Sergio Perez Classified as Finished places in a row until he retired at the Melbourne GP at 21 + 8 = 29 races.

  3. Something that was mentioned in the race: it was the first time a driver had been given two pit-stop time penalties. We can no doubt expect to see a rule update to cover this scenario, even though one is not necessary.

    Also, this penalty points rule is, in my opinion, not working. Drivers are accumulating points for every slight mistake regarding the rules. It was brought in to stop consistently terrible driving, like Maldonado or Grosjean back in the day. So far nobody has got a race ban, but there will come a time when somebody gets one undeservingly

    1. @strontium Bianchi had two at Monaco in 2014. The second was for serving the first during a Safety Car period!

      https://www.racefans.net/statistics/2014-f1-statistics/2014-penalties-index/

      1. @keithcollantine Sorry, I realised just after commenting I should have clarified that I meant two to serve at the same time

    2. Shaun Robinson (@)
      11th April 2017, 10:23

      I think after having 3(?) seasons that the rule has been in place and no-one being punished, if someone gets a race ban, they probably deserve it. The drivers are well aware of the rules, they get warning to know when they are close to getting the ban – no excuse really.

      In the case of Perez, he has been treading on eggshells getting involved in political issues and can count himself lucky for not being punished for that. Although I’m not sure what the punishment is for breaching that particular rule.

      1. Fukobayashi (@)
        11th April 2017, 11:20

        “In the case of Perez, he has been treading on eggshells getting involved in political issues and can count himself lucky for not being punished for that. Although I’m not sure what the punishment is for breaching that particular rule.”

        Are you a Trump supporter perchance?

  4. Why is nobody talking about Lance Stroll?

    From Perez’ onboard you can see Perez was clearly alongside and Stroll should have seen him. To me this AGAIN fully Stroll’s fault. It’s getting a bit rediculous imho.

    1. Fudge Kobayashi (@)
      10th April 2017, 14:06

      Because this article is on stats. Plenty of people are talking about it here:

      https://www.racefans.net/2017/04/09/stroll-perez-crash-corner/

      1. @offdutyrockstar Haha whoops! I completely missed that article…

        1. F Kobayashi (@)
          10th April 2017, 14:48

          It happens! Lots to get through after a race weekend. :D

  5. I didn’t like Hamilton much but I have to agree that he is one of the best of the 2000 generation. For me it’s something like that:

    #Tier 1
    Vettel / Hamilton / Verstappen / Alonso

    #Tier 2
    Riccardo / Hulkenberg / Perez

    #Tier 3
    Bottas / Sainz / Kvyat (Kvyat have much to prove yet maybe I should put him one tier below. Bottas need to raise his game to be at least a tier 2 driver to maintain his seat.)

    #Tier 4
    Massa / Raikonen / Grosjean / Magnussen (I think both Raikonen and Massa was at Tier 2 in a certain period of their careers. Nowadays they can be at that level sometimes.)

    #Tier 5 (those are the drivers that are on the F1 cutting line or below)
    Palmer / Magnussen / Vandoorne / Ocon / Wherlein / Ericsson (Ocon and Vandoorne can get to Tier 2 in the future. Ericsson could be one tier above but he still need to proves himself significatively better than Wherlein.)

    #Tier 6 (Drivers that, for now, don’t have conditions to be on F1)
    Stroll (He really needs to do well in the next race.)

    1. Grosjean has had some great drives the last couple of years. Raikkonen and Massa hasnt and are living on past glory. Hulkenberg i think is largely overrated and Ric is only tier two because he gets crushed by Verstappen which is a strange thing. 6 months ago i would rate him top 3 and he may very well belong up there without having anything to show for it since hes driving against the number 1. Bottas has never impressed me and even less so this season when hes driving against a competent driver.

      I would move Hulkenberg, Bottas, Massa, and Raikkonen down and Grosjean up. I would also rate Ericsson higher but he has never had material and/or teammates to prove his worth against. Which is also true for basicly everyone in tier 5. I would call tier 5 the uncertain/untested tier.

      1. I’d move RoGro up for sure. He was useless in his first attempt but he is a great driver now in my opinion. Would love to see him get Kimis seat

    2. If you really think Kvyat would do better than Raikkonen in the Ferrari and on the same note, that Raikkonen would do worse than Kvyat in the Toro Rosso, you clearly are watching something on your own

      1. Gabriel I kind of agree about Grojean, but I think he still needs to prove himself more consistent, he is a lot more experient now. And I still think Raikonen and Massa would do better than any of the drivers listed below them.

        I feel the same about Riccardo, last year I would put him in the Tier 1, but Verstappen is reaching this level and he not. But he have the potential for sure.

      2. I have some faith in Kvyat and he is at the same league of Sainz now, that’s the main point for me.

        1. Also i would move Magnussen down one notch if he wasnt already there ;)

    3. I’d put Palmer in your tier 6 category.

    4. Where is Giovinazzi?
      He managed to crash in both Quali and Race in only his 2nd weekend for his team.

      As VER is the last one to manage this feat, I reckon that GIO will be in tier 1 as well :p

      1. Was under changeable conditions and they even removed the bump on the last turn afterwards that caused it. Showing some real talent but just got unlucky I think.

        Would like to see him get another shot

    5. I’d take your comment a whole lot seriously if you didn’t put Vandoorne so low, have you even seen him go to work?

      1. Like I said, I think he can be Tier 2, but he needs to prove himself yet. In those first 2 races he was far, very far behind Alonso. We know that Alonso is one of the best, but for Vandorne be considered close to him he needs to improve a lot.

    6. I would put Daniel in Tier 1 and Max in Tier 2 ….. I don’t think Max is Tier 1 …. YET

    7. Ferrari, Seb fan
      11th April 2017, 9:17

      I would put ocon a tear higher, he has had a solid season so far

      1. Ferrari, Seb fan
        11th April 2017, 9:19

        *tier

    8. I would put Kimi in tier p45.

    9. I’d move Ricciardo up to tier one. He comprehensively beat Vettel in their season together.

      Also Bottas is really underrated. He is closer in qualifying to Hamilton than Rosberg was. Rosberg was just flattered by there being no competition to get ahead of him and he was almost guaranteed a 2nd place if Hamilton’s car had no issues. If Hamilton was out it was a pole (and/or race win) and of course Hamilton had lots of technical issues.

      Sure, Bottas made a dumb error spinning behind the safety car, but is it really that much worse than the way Rosberg was bumbling along in Monaco in the wet? Besides, all of the tier 1 drivers have made similarly dumb mistakes.

  6. Flemish Nedward
    10th April 2017, 15:49

    I was at the GP last weekend, and it was pretty damn cold! It got me thinking,which have been the coldest race weekends in 21st Century F1, or even in championship history?

    I’m guessing that, besides perhaps the odd event at Silverstone or the Nurburgring, yesterday’s race could have been the coldest in a long time.

    1. Yep, was absolutely miserable in the stands.

    2. Tony Mansell
      11th April 2017, 8:57

      Weirdly it was 12 degrees for qually in Austria 2 years ago. I know I was there. I was freezing. It can be 35 that time of year and was 25 for the race.

  7. I understand that statistics focus on the ‘pointy end’.
    However it must be worth a mention that Alonso has been in a top 10 racing position for at least 30 laps in the last 4 GP’s ;) or :(

  8. God knows how many fastest race lap Hamilton or Rosberg could have got if they were not simply focused on the victory and saving machinery. That also affects these grand slams and chelems.

    1. If they had pursued that avenue then maybe they’d have created so much resentment from other teams the FIA would have been forced to do something, and one can’t rule out the introduction of a handicap system as part of that equalisation process.

  9. Given that Mercedes still seems to be the fastest car by ~0.2sec and because N.Rosberg is not HAM’s team mate anymore OR V.Bottas is HAM’s team mate now… there’re big chances indeed HAM will detrone M.Schumacher from the all time PP list. The way things look at the moment, I hardly believe BOT will outqualify HAM more than 2 times this season… if it’ll happen at all. The future is bright for HAM regarding the all-time stats.

  10. So … isn’t Lewis technically leading the championship by the dint of having had two poles to Vettel’s none ??

    1. There’s nothing in the Sporting Regulations about pole positions – just what’s in the excerpt above.

    2. Negative, poles are not used in the tie breaker criteria.

      1. Although presumably they could be in this context

        d) If this procedure fails to produce a result, the FIA will nominate the winner according to such criteria as it thinks fit.

        1. Andre Furtado
          10th April 2017, 22:51

          The color of the car or the car number could also be in this context. As well whoever has the smallest foot or longest finger nail.

        2. It certainly makes sense. There is a trophy given for most poles. There is also a ceremony after Q3. So poles are clearly an important metric.

          Is there any other metric that has this kind of credibility attached to it?

          Not that it matters, it is exceedingly unlikely over a whole season to have a tie on countback.

  11. Not a new stat (should have been in Australia) but I learnt in the Sky Sports commentary that K-Mag has become the first driver to enter a race with all the hybrid power units – Mercedes in 2014, Honda in 2015, Renault in 2016 and now Ferrari in 2017

    About the race itself
    – Mercedes, RB, Ferrari (the top 3 teams since 2014) have finished in the top 6 – how many times has this happened?
    – Can’t remember the last time someone has span under a Safety Car… surely a while ago?
    – On the “perfect tie”, I believe this must be the first time in a while where there is a perfect tie for championship lead?

    1. Actually it isn’t a perfect tie. A perfect tie would be if they had the same number of pole positions. If Vettel had taken pole in China, but finished second, then it would be the perfect tie.

    2. Sorry. Didn’t realise that they scrapped the pole position rule. I always thought if the drivers had the same number of points along with the same number of 1st,2nd and 3rd positions, then they looked at who took pole for often.

  12. Hamilton’s 6th pole (equalling Melbourne), 5th win (equalling Montreal and Hungaroring), and 8th podium (most of any track) at Shanghai.

    M Schumacher is the only other driver to have managed 5+ wins at 3+ different tracks.

    2nd year in a row that Palmer has not started Race 2 from the grid. One could argue that Vettel also did not start either of those races from the position that he qualified in…

    Hamilton keeps alive his streak of at least 1 win per season since his debut in 2007.

    The top 5 positions were occupied by the same teams in the same order as last year (Mercedes-Ferrari-Red Bull-Red Bull-Ferrari).

    McLaren’s first double DNF since Singapore 2015.

    Hamilton has scored as many podiums with Mercedes as Rosberg managed in his entire career (57).

    Hamilton has won more races for Mercedes than Alonso has managed in his career (33 vs 32).

    12th time that Hamilton has started on pole with Vettel 2nd – each driver has won 6 of those races.

    Best start for the Enstone team since Belgium 2015.

    Thanks to statsf1.com, magnetimarelli.com and formula1.com for some of these.

  13. 100th Podium for RedBull

    1. I’m going to play the ‘massive pedantry’ card on this one.

      It was the 100th time at least one Red Bull driver was classified in the top three. However Red Bull drivers have achieved a total of 136 podium placings.

      This statistic is obviously complicated by occasions when a driver appeared on the podium but was later demoted, such as Ricciardo in the 2014 Australian Grand Prix and Vettel in the 2012 German Grand Prix.

  14. Hamilton extends his record as the only driver in history to have a pole and a win in every season he has competed in Formula 1.

  15. Interesting little stat I hadn’t seen here that was mentioned on the Sky F1 site:

    Hamilton’s fastest lap from Shanghai was 4.4 seconds quicker than last year’s equivalent

    Hamilton’s car number of course being 44 I thought this was a nice coincidence :)

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