[Jody Barton]

So the teams have a single week to turn thing round before they're in China. The track should definitely suit Mercedes given the characteristics of their car being front end happy. However, Ferrari look light on their front tyres too. It'll be down too the high speed corners this weekend so maybe even RBR will come into play. Also think it'll be a good track for Renault and Toro Rosso of the midfield teams. Historically Grosjean goes well here too. Friday practice sessions should be fun, I wonder when teams will start considering bringing a second engine into rotation. China is too soon I think, but if teams are planning on taking a fourth engine this year Baku and Barcelona will certainly be where it happens, but given the nature of Shanghai maybe some will take a new unit here.

[Monster Hesh]

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Perfect speculative preview from Jody. 
RedBull chance to shine hear, sector 2 has been theirs for years. 
Qually was brilliantly close last year, be good if we have a repeat. 
Excited to see TR speed traps figures, they could suffer in all those medium-highspeed corners, but still a good amount of traction zones for them.
Midfield fight will be fascinating once again. Thanks to this Formula two tiers, top 6: 1 second a lap quicker than 7th and down.

Great to see a bigger step in the tyre compounds, with Pirelli bringing the UltraSoft instead of the SuperSoft. Will it make for a better strategy show, along with teams tyre selections? Hopefully, Bahrain was interesting. The Supers went along way last year (which are the basis of this years Softs), so maybe a stretched one stop.

Weather wise, Friday is looking wet, great weekend ruined (for me), but  in the past, if teams can't do race prep, it has led to great unknowns in the race which has created a good show.
Saturday and Sunday stable on the weather and temperature front 18-20C, so over heating tyres might not be caused by track temps.

[Jody Barton]

Hesh, it's all those traction zones n Shanghai that lead me to believe Torro Rosson should have a good time, that and I think they've proven to be light on their fronts the past few seasons, and so far this seasons TR looks to be more rear limited than front end limited, but it's not massive difference between front and rear for them... also I heard TR are bringing an upgrade package to Shanghai.

Shanghai has tended to be a one stop race over recent years, and it was only a two stop race last year because of the rain. There are also always safety cars in China. Always. I'd like a bit of rain like last year to spice it up... but I'd also like it not to rain so we can get a better picture of the pecking order this year. We'll see I guess. I think Mercedes and Hamilton in particular need to hit back ASAP, because if Vettel builds up a head of steam this year, I really don't see him overhauling it.

[Monster Hesh]

Elements logged after the Bahrain race.
Some teams already brought the allocated limit of Energy Stores and Control Electronics into rotation. 
Did Ferrari change Vettels after FP3 at Bahrain? I missed that.

[Jody Barton]

I bloody knew it Hesh!!! I'd heard they'd taken the back end off of Sebs car and were working on the engine, I think I even asked the question on here I think about it. If they've had to bin the first they're in trouble.

PS we knew about Bottas after his cock up on Melbourne.

[morini]

PS we knew about Bottas after his cock up on Melbourne.

Excuse the dullard question, but why would Bottas smacking the car in a wall mean new control electronics? I don't quite get that?

[Antilochos]

PS we knew about Bottas after his cock up on Melbourne.

Excuse the dullard question, but why would Bottas smacking the car in a wall mean new control electronics? I don't quite get that?

Maybe it should be Bahrein instead of Melbourne?

[Monster Hesh]

Don't quite get how CE fail in the first place. It's just a CPU no? Unless physically damaged? Does on of the other components have issues and it scrabbles the coding in the CE element?

After Melbourne is correct.

[morini]

After Melbourne is correct.

Well, no, not really. He threw it into the wall in quali, so "during" Melbourne would be most accurate?

[Jody Barton]

As I understand it when Bottas dropped his car during quali in Melbourne he also took a grid penalty for changing his gearbox, as to quote Allison they weren't even sure which bits of metal they collected were even from the gearbox. Mercedes also informed us they needed to replace the Energy Stores on his car as they were utterly ruined and destroyed and the Control Electronics apparently took a massive static shock from the ES and were also utterly covered in cooling fluid, and therefore kiboshed. So yeah, we knew about Bottas.

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Plus I did totally call out Seb having an issue in the Bahrain race thread, knew I did:

07-04-2018, 03:32 PM
Hearing Ferrari mechanics frantically working in the engine in Sebs car... That could sting if he already has to take new engine parts.

Any way, I'm hoping FP2 and FP3 are actually indicative of performance, and if they are then we're in for a great qualifying, and an even better race... until they all turn the engines down and get out and push.