Following Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton’s disqualifications at the Chinese Grand Prix, Sky Sports F1’s Bernie Collins takes a closer look at what happened and the consequences going forward.

Leclerc’s car was 1kg under the 800kg car weight limit and Hamilton’s plank underneath the car had excessive wear by half a millimetre.

The pair finished fifth and sixth respectively in the race but Ferrari came out of Sunday’s grand prix without any points.

Did Ferrari set-up changes contribute to Hamilton disqualification?

Hamilton won Saturday’s Sprint in brilliant fashion but Ferrari, like everyone else, still made set-up changes to adapt or improve for Sunday’s race.

Bernie says: “I don’t think it’s unusual to change set-up after the Sprint because you know in the Sprint that you’re never going to run 100kg of fuel.

“One of those changes could be raising your right height because you know you will have to start on higher fuel.

“What’s different between this and Austin two years ago [when Hamilton’s Mercedes was excluded for the same reason], you were not allowed to change the set-up between the Sprint and main race, so when you got the plank-wear read in the Sprint, you couldn’t react to it.

“In the Sprint, there was a lot more management than the main race because they did more laps pushing on a hard tyre, whereas on the medium they did a lot of management in the Sprint, so it wouldn’t surprise me if the wear and fuel usage went up in the main race.”

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Hamilton led from start to finish as he claimed his first victory with Ferrari in the Sprint at the Chinese Grand Prix

Did Hamilton’s two-stop strategy have an impact on plank wear?

Hamilton was the only driver in the original top 10 to execute a two-stop race, after starting on medium tyres and pitting for hards on lap 13 and hards again on lap 37 in the 56-lap race.

BC says: “The two-stopper will lead to pushing more on each lap. The only slight counter to that for Lewis is because he did two stints on the hard, he goes through that graining phase, which does control the pace a little bit.

“The only other thing for Lewis is, I don’t know if he had any damage from the Leclerc incident? The FIA say there were ‘no mitigating circumstances’ and if Ferrari could prove damage or lack of downforce, they would have been able to do that but they didn’t.

“As for Leclerc, who did a one-stop, people were saying maybe a one-stop was possible. They didn’t know how much the hard tyre would wear, so they didn’t have an estimated mass loss for the hard tyre but they are allowed to take pick-up and they changed Leclerc’s front wing.

“I don’t know where the loss in mass has come from.”

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Hamilton was frustrated with the performance of his Ferrari after initially finishing sixth

Do Ferrari have a fundamental car design issue?

Interestingly, there were whispers in the paddock after Australia that Ferrari had to raise their car for the season-opener to avoid too much plank wear. While the team have not commented on the alleged issue, Hamilton being disqualified for excessive plank wear a week later has raised eyebrows.

Bernie says: “It would be standard for everyone to raise the car in Australia because of the bumps and they are detrimental to downforce and plank wear.

“In Australia, Ferrari were not that strong. Some of it was down to strategy but the performance in qualifying was not that strong, so maybe they have a car that’s very sensitive to ride height in terms of aero performance. All of these cars are because they’re all ground-effect cars, but maybe it is more sensitive than others.

“I would be surprised that the Sprint in China was not a good enough indication that you would be illegal on plank wear.

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Sky Sports’ Karun Chandhok hails the significance of Hamilton’s Sprint victory in China and explains why he cannot be dismissed as a contender for the Drivers’ Championship

“If they have got what we would call a ‘peaky’ ride height, which means there’s a very small optimum ride height that you can have a good aerodynamic platform in, that is an issue for a car.

“You want to be fit to run a range of ride heights because of all these range of tracks. For example, in Austria there are intense kerbs so you want to add a bit of ride height there.

“Maybe the aero platform is too peaky.”

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It was an exciting start to the Chinese GP with Leclerc losing his left front wing after clipping Ferrari team-mate Hamilton!

What will Ferrari do now to ensure they are legal for Suzuka?

Bernie says: “Fundamentally, it’s the race engineer’s job that the car is legal. Each race engineer for each car, it lies with them that the car is legal.

“They will try and understand why it’s illegal in both instances, in the weight and plank wear. It would be lovely to know if Leclerc was legal on plank wear. We know Lewis’ car was legal on weight because all cars are checked on weight. We don’t know if Leclerc was legal on plank wear because his car was not checked for it.

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Highlights from the 2025 Chinese Grand Prix from the Shanghai International Circuit

“The teams will know how much the cars are bottoming out. They will go through all their procedures to see what was it that took them over the limit and which margin needs to be changed.

“I don’t believe anyone out there sets up the car thinking it’s going to be illegal on plank wear and hope they don’t get checked.”

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Sky F1’s Ted Kravitz reflects on all the big talking points from the Chinese Grand Prix

What does all this mean for Hamilton relationship with Ferrari engineers?

Bernie says: “It’s a bump because Ferrari had the wrong strategy in Australia, in China they have been disqualified so should have done better, and they arguably had the wrong strategy because Lewis should not have pitted for a second time.

“Lewis was really struggling in the car on Sunday and the car was illegal. The changes in set-up didn’t react in the way he wanted to, or he wouldn’t have been so slow in the race, and they’ve been illegal.

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Listen in on the radio messages from Hamilton’s first race with Ferrari throughout the Australian Grand Prix

“So it is a bump. If they go through it and they find whatever’s wrong, then Lewis can get over that pretty quickly. But it’s one of these little things that adds to the lack of trust.

“When Sebastian Vettel came to us at Aston Martin, I really wanted him to think we were good at our jobs.

“I really wanted him to go ‘if she calls me to pit, I’m going to do it’ because I trust the team. Now we have had a strategy thing, a radio thing and now disqualification, so it makes the driver unsure.”

Formula 1 heads to the iconic Suzuka Circuit for the Japanese Grand Prix on April 4-6, live on Sky Sports F1. Stream Sky Sports with NOW – No contract, cancel anytime