Mercedes set the bar high once again as Formula One championship leader George Russell secured pole position for the first sprint race of the season in China and clinched a front row lockout with teammate Kimi Antonelli.
Russell carried over his winning momentum from Australia to land a dominant pole position for Saturday's sprint race.
Russell laid down a championship marker to win the season-opener and now looks set to dominate the second round in Shanghai.
The British driver finished 0.289 seconds clear of teammate Antonelli for Saturday's 19-lap dash to the chequered flag.
Russell led every phase of the session at the Shanghai circuit to take his first career sprint pole in a time of one minute and 31.520 seconds.
McLaren's Lando Norris was third fastest and will start from that position after the reigning champion told stewards he had not been on a proper “push” lap when Antonelli, who had risked a grid drop, impeded him during the second phase.
Ferrari's Lewis Hamilton, who started the 100km race on pole in China last year, was fourth fastest ahead of McLaren's Oscar Piastri and Ferrari's Charles Leclerc.
The race on Saturday brings eight points to the winner with the top eight scoring. The main race is on Sunday.
“The car has been feeling amazing,” said Russell, winner of the Australian season-opener last weekend. “We knew after Melbourne we had a really good car, the engine is performing really well, and today it was a real joy to drive.
“It felt really quick and that was pretty cool, very different to Melbourne.”
Norris said Russell holds a greater advantage than the one he had during his championship winning campaign.
“I know how everyone talks about how big our gap was last year, but we certainly didn't get close to winning every race,” said Norris, who crossed the line only eight tenths clear of Verstappen in the first race in Melbourne 12 months ago. Last Sunday, Russell lapped the entire field up to sixth.
And Norris added: “Mercedes were certainly a lot closer to us than we currently are to them.
“They have a big advantage over everyone but that is because they have worked hard and they deserve to be in the position they are in.
“You would expect Mercedes to dominate for a while. We will do our best to change that.”
Max Verstappen has already expressed his disdain for the new regulations, and his latest effort is unlikely to change his thoughts.
He finished eighth in China – a stunning 1.7 seconds down. “This is undriveable,” said Verstappen as he drove his Red Bull back to the pits. “We have never had anything this bad.”
Meanwhile, Hamilton said the engineers had done a great job to get the car ready after he spun off in a tricky practice session.
“The car generally felt great. I think it is on the straights, it's a lot of time to be losing so we have a lot of work to do, we really have to push so hard to improve on power.”
