Lewis Hamilton 'gobsmacked' by Ferrari speed in China

Lewis Hamilton said he was "shocked" to earn Ferrari their first pole position in the Chinese Grand Prix sprint race. Hamilton out-qualified Red Bull's Max Verstappen, with his Ferrari teammate Charles Leclerc in fourth and McLaren's Lando Norris in sixth.

The seven-time world champion, making his first appearance for Ferrari at last weekend's Australian Grand Prix, qualified eighth and finished ninth in the race. He stated: "I'm so surprised, I don't know how we got to where we are, and after a difficult weekend last week, to come here and have a car that felt strong, I was aggressive, I was hopeful going into today, and to put it on the front row, I'm very, very happy."

Hamilton continued: "I started feeling the car was better from the beginning, I just can't believe we're at the front. I'm just a little bit in shock." Despite Hamilton's record-breaking 104 pole positions in his career, starting first in a sprint race remains an unfamiliar experience for him.

He had previously only achieved a sprint race pole once, at the 2021 British Grand Prix, where he was overtaken by Verstappen at the start and had to settle for second place in the 17-lap sprint. Hamilton's last full-race pole position was at the 2023 Hungarian Grand Prix, 20 months ago.

In Shanghai, Hamilton was 0.208 seconds ahead of Leclerc and 0.544 seconds ahead of Norris. This result gives Hamilton a favorable starting position in Saturday's shorter sprint race at 03:00 GMT, after which teams can modify their car setups before the main race qualifying at 07:00 GMT.

Hamilton stated: "Even if it's not a qualifying session for the main race, it gives me real inspiration to go into tomorrow and try and eke out more performance, and see if we can compete again. There's definitely more performance to find, that's for sure."

Leclerc commented: "I struggled in the garage. I felt like I was a step behind Lewis from the beginning, he was just faster. Struggled a lot in Turn 1, 2 and 3, similar to last year. Apart from that, it was tight. It's a shame we're starting fourth, but Lewis is on pole, so hopefully we can have a great race as a team."

Verstappen was followed by McLaren's Oscar Piastri in third, ahead of Leclerc, Mercedes' George Russell, and Norris. Norris, who started from pole and won in wet conditions at the Australian Grand Prix opener, made errors on both of his laps in the final stage of the Chinese sprint qualifying.

Norris said: "I made a mistake - I locked up in the last corner. But we're just struggling a little bit at the moment. Just not quick enough, simple as that. It's me trying to push too hard. Just need to chill out a little bit and not try to push too hard. I think the car's still good, in a good window, probably not good enough for pole. But we can definitely move forward in the sprint."

Ferrari team principal Frederic Vasseur said he felt the result reflected how close the competition was between the top four teams, and how difficult it was to get the cars into the right setup window and get the tires working at their best. Vasseur said: "It's a bit difficult to read today. McLaren were ahead this morning, in Q1 we were ahead, Q2 they were great, Q3 we came back. I think it's about tire management. If you are not in the right window you are struggling a lot, but it's good for the team. We had a tough weekend in Melbourne but Friday was good. It's a bit like this weekend, very up and down. It's exactly the same situation as last year - the last four races, three or four teams were able to win, from track to track you have 30 seconds difference, depending on the tires."