Empires take years to build in Formula 1, but they can come crashing down in an instant.
Much has changed in the F1 landscape in the half-decade since the last Chinese Grand Prix, and when the sport touches down in Shanghai this weekend for the first time since 2019, it will do so under the control of new dynasty.
In the last five years Red Bull Racing has acceded to the throne, with both the drivers and constructors championships in its iron grip.
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The Mercedes era, the longest and most glittering ever known to the sport, has ended with barely a whimper.
Max Verstappen has usurped Lewis Hamilton’s as Formula 1’s protagonist, establishing himself as the greatest of his generation and with the potential to make himself a contender for greatest of all time.
Australia, too has had its Formula 1 outlook changed dramatically in the last five seasons. Then it was Daniel Ricciardo embarking on an ambitious plan to make himself a world champion; now it’s young gun Oscar Piastri making his first steps towards superstardom.
THE 2019 CHINESE GRAND PRIX
The 2019 Formula 1 season was one of great upheaval, and with China slotting into position as the third round of the season, there was still much growing pain in the paddock.
Daniel Ricciardo had put the driver market into significant flux a few months earlier with his shock decision to leave Red Bull Racing for Renault.
The knock-on effects were substantial.
Pierre Gasly was promoted into his place from Toro Rosso, and the team sacked Kiwi Brendon Hartley in the second car. In their places were F1 returnee Daniil Kvyat and Thai debutant Alex Albon.
By the middle of the season Gasly and Albon had their places switched, the former having struggled to adapt at RBR and the latter impressing with Toro Rosso.
Ricciardo’s move pushed Sainz out of Renault and to McLaren, where he replaced the retiring — temporarily — Fernando Alonso. His teammate was promising debutant Lando Norris, replacing Stoffel Vandoorne.
Charles Leclerc was sensationally promoted to Ferrari alongside Sebastian Vettel after just one season at Alfa Romeo.
His was a straight swap with Kimi Räikkönen, who partnered Antonio Giovinazzi at Alfa Romeo in the Italian’s first full-time season.
Lance Stroll left Williams for Racing Point following his father’s buyout of the team, displacing Esteban Ocon, who was sidelined for the year.
Stroll was replaced by reigning Formula 2 champion George Russell at Williams. His teammate was Robert Kubica in a single-year F1 comeback that pushed Sergey Sirotkin out of F1.
But the more things changed, the more things stayed the same.
At the front it was business as usual. Valtteri Bottas started the Chinese Grand Prix from pole position, but teammate Lewis Hamilton, starting from second, got the better of the Finn to win the race in Mercedes one-two formation. Vettel completed the podium in a distant third.
Hamilton’s success seemed never-ending at the time. He wasn’t to know what the future held in store.
HAMILTON HURTLES TOWARDS HIS CAREER ZENITH
Victory in China was Hamilton’s second in a row, putting him up to 75 career victories, second only to Michael Schumacher’s 91 and 23 more than the then third-placed Sebastian Vettel.
The Briton was in sizzling form. He claimed the 2018 championship in the most dominant year of his career, with 11 victories, 11 poles and 17 podium appearances for what was then a career-high 408 points.
His win count was accelerating. After taking nine victories in 2017, he scored 11 in all three of the following years, including in the 17-race 2020 campaign.
He was a five-time champion, equal with the great Juan Manuel Fangio and behind only Michael Schumacher. By the end of the year he’d have his sixth.
He already held the record for most poles of any driver in history, with 84 to his name, 15 more than Michael Schumacher.
Lewis Hamilton stats to the end of the 2019 Chinese GP
Entries: 233 starts
Wins: 75 (32.19 per cent)
Poles: 84 (36.05 per cent)
Titles: 5
Max Verstappen, on the other hand, was struggling to build career momentum.
He’d established himself as Red Bull Racing’s undisputed number one after Ricciardo upped stumps and was a podium regular, but the gap to Mercedes remained stubbornly large.
More annoying still was that Ferrari was now second-best, keeping Verstappen off the rostrum more often than not.
Max Verstappen stats to the end of the 2019 Chinese GP
Entries: 85 starts
Wins: 5 (5.88 per cent)
Poles: 0 (0 per cent)
Titles: 0
Verstappen was always billed for greatness, but as he finished fourth and almost half a minute off the lead in China, it was difficult to see it over the horizon.
VERSTAPPEN ENDS THE HAMILTON ERA
The green shoots of Verstappen’s destiny became clear through 2019, even if they weren’t obvious at the time.
Red Bull Racing switched to Honda power that year, becoming the de facto works team of the Japanese giant just as its power unit was finally starting to come good.
Verstappen won three races in 2019, starting at the home of Red Bull in Austria followed by another at the home of Mercedes in Germany.
His third, in Brazil, was a statement of intent at the end of a year Ferrari’s title challenge faded badly, nosing him ahead of Charles Leclerc for third in the drivers standings.
The 2020 season was all Mercedes, but Verstappen was outstanding, standing on the podium in every race he finished bar one, in the bizarre conditions of the Turkish Grand Prix.
His season-ending victory in Abu Dhabi that year set the tone for 2021.
The rule changes for that year — aimed at reducing downforce to protect Pirelli’s tyres following a pandemic hiatus on testing — created a chink in Mercedes’s armour.
Red Bull Racing exploited it mercilessly to power Verstappen to his maiden title in acrimonious circ*mstances.
We weren’t to know it at the time, but it was the dawn of the Verstappen era.
Max Verstappen stats since the 2019 Chinese GP
Entries: 104 starts
Wins: 52 (50 per cent)
Poles: 36 (34.62 per cent)
Titles: 3
His current victory tally of 57 puts him outright third on the leaderboard, 34 victories behind Michael Schumacher. It’s possible for him to match and beat the German legend by the end of next season.
He’s tipped to win his fifth championship at the end of next year too, putting him equal with Fangio in third.
From a standing start in 2019 he’s moved up to fifth in the pole count, though he’s still 21 P1 starts behind Sebastian Vettel for fourth and 68 behind leader Hamilton.
Hamilton and Mercedes, meanwhile, have never truly recovered.
Despite switching focus to the sweeping 2022 rule changes earlier than Red Bull Racing, Mercedes badly bungled the new regulations.
While Red Bull Racing set what’s become the dominant design philosophy of the ground-effect era, Mercedes has fumbled.
Worse, however, was that it doubled down on its flawed 2022 design in 2023. Changes were made at the executive level of the design office, but the car produced for 2024 — a completely fresh design — is afflicted by many of the same problems, leaving the team looking totally wayward and far from the dominant force of 2019.
Hamilton has been hit hardest by the downturn.
The Briton had boasted an unprecedented record of at least one win every year of his career at the end of 2021.
His winless 2022 campaign was an undesirable first, doubled down by another barren run in 2023.
His last victory remains the 2021 Saudi Arabian Grand Prix, the race that drew him level with Verstappen in the title standings.
Lewis Hamilton stats since the 2019 Chinese GP
Entries: 103 starts
Wins: 28 (27.18 per cent)
Poles: 20 (19.42 per cent)
Titles: 2
Those stats are entirely frontloaded. Since the beginning of 2022 he’s won no races (0 per cent) and collected just one pole position (2.08 per cent).
In the same time Verstappen has won 37 races (77.08 per cent) and taken 23 poles (47.92 per cent).
You couldn’t imagine a greater contrast of fortunes than the 2019 and 2024 Chinese grands prix.
RED BULL RACING ON TRACK TO BREAK MERCEDES RECORDS
Verstappen’s ascendancy goes hand in hand with Red Bull Racing’s rise to power.
Mercedes was in the thick of a dominant run after the 2019 Chinese Grand Prix. It had just won five consecutive constructor-driver championship doubles and would win another two to go with the 2021 constructors championship.
Hamilton’s win in China was the team’s 90th, putting it sixth for all-time wins by a constructor, well ahead of Red Bull Racing’s 59 at the time.
But the balance of power is rapidly reversing.
Red Bull Racing’s mastery of the ground-effect rules have delivered it two dominant seasons in succession and taken it to within just nine wins of Mercedes’s tally.
Wins by constructors
Mercedes: 125
Red Bull Racing: 116
There’s every chance RBR will resume its lead in this highly personal battle before the end of the European season in early September, needing just 10 wins to overhaul the German marque.
It’s an idea that would have seemed totally fanciful just five season ago.
CHANGING OF THE AUSTRALIAN GUARD
The 2019 season was the first of Daniel Ricciardo’s post-Red Bull Racing career. Whatever your opinion of his move away from Milton Keynes, there’s no doubt this was a pivotal decision.
In China in 2019 the Aussie was still in his acclimatisation phase with the French squad, but by the end of the year he was firing on all cylinders.
His 2020 season ranks easily as among his best, hauling his uncompetitive car to the podium twice after a trio of near misses.
As 2020 turned to 2021, it seemed almost certain that Ricciardo was positioning himself perfectly to collect a swag of victories and perhaps line himself up for a title shot with his decision to move to McLaren, nominally as team leader.
Unfortunately that’s when things began to decline for Ricciardo, and it’s a decision from which he’s still attempting to resurrect his career.
Daniel Ricciardo, before and after China 2019
Before: 152 races, 7 wins, 992 points (6.53 points per race)
After: 91 races, 1 win, 325 points (3.57 points per race)
Unbeknown to most, however, another Australian was preparing to stand up and be counted on the same weekend as the 2019 Chinese Grand Prix.
Just one week after his 18th birthday, a Melburnian named Oscar Piastri was suiting up for the first race of the 2019 Formula Renault Eurocup season in Monza.
He’d raced in the category one year earlier but had failed to win, standing on the podium only three times.
Piastri’s start to the 2019 season was similarly underwhelming. He finished a scoreless 18th on Saturday, though he improved to fourth on Sunday, just hours after Hamilton won in Shanghai on the other side of the world.
But he dominated the next round in Silverstone, winning both races, and there was no stopping him from there.
By the end of the season he’d won his first championship. He won the Formula 3 title on debut the following year and the F2 championship in his rookie season in 2021, contributing to a CV that got him his McLaren Formula 1 debut in 2023.
Oscar Piastri, before and after China 2019
Before: 71 races, 6 wins, 0 championships
After (excl. F1): 60 races, 15 wins, 3 championships
After (F1 only): 26 races, 129 points (4.96 points per race)
Few knew his name this time five years ago, but there are few who wouldn’t recognise Piastri as the country’s best hope for its next world championship today.
This weekend will be Piastri’s first Chinese Grand Prix, along with debuts for Yuki Tsunoda, Logan Sargeant and home favourite Zhou Guanyu.
The grid is surprisingly familiar, with 16 drivers having raced in Shanghai before, 14 of whom entered the race in 2019.
But while the names might be similar, their order is wildly different.
Much like Lewis Hamilton in 2019, this year’s it’s Max Verstappen who’s shaping the sport in his image, and there’s little sign of his empire crumbling any time soon.
