The Latest Breaking News from Zhou Guanyu

Sainz led from the start, with team-mate Charles Leclerc passing George Russell’s Mercedes for an early Ferrari 1-2.

Sainz led from the start, with team-mate Charles Leclerc passing George Russell’s Mercedes for an early Ferrari 1-2.

While Bottas continuing with the Swiss outfit was a formality, there had been some question marks over Zhou.

Despite Zhou being the first full-time Chinese F1 racer, there has been speculation he does not come with major financial banking to incentivise Alfa Romeo to agree on new terms.

Despite Zhou being the first full-time Chinese F1 racer, there has been speculation he does not come with major financial banking to incentivise Alfa Romeo to agree new terms.

Verstappen set a new, all-time record of 10 consecutive F1 race victories.

Sainz will start ahead of Max Verstappen (Red Bull) and Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) in Sunday’s race after the one-hour qualifying session on Friday, which is split into three segments with five cars each being knocked out in Q1 and Q2 before the top-10 shootout of Q3.

On his 29th birthday, Sainz topped second practice by 0.019s from McLaren’s Lando Norris in an eventful session stalled by two red flags; the first early on for Lance Stroll stopping with a suspected fuel system issue in his Aston Martin and the second late in the session for Sergio Perez…

Red Bull’s Max Verstappen was quickest in Free Practice 1, before Sainz set the fastest time of the day in FP2 at 1m21.355s, 0.019s quicker than McLaren’s Lando Norris and Red Bull’s Sergio Perez.