Shanghai International Circuit combines a 1.2-kilometer back straight with a tightening opening corner that punishes the front-left tyre for hours.
What it is
- 5.451 km, 16 corners
- Back straight of about 1.2 km into one of the heaviest braking zones of the year
- Turns 1–3 form a tightening spiral taken at a continuously falling radius
- A WEC fixture from 2012 to 2019, in both 6-hour and 4-hour formats
What it demands
The opening spiral is the tyre test of the calendar. Steering angle rises while speed falls, and the front-left carries the load for far longer than in a normal corner. Over a stint that single sequence sets the wear limit for the whole car.
At the other end of the lap, the long straight makes slipstreaming and late braking realistic, so overtakes happen where drivers can see them coming. That combination — one corner that ruins tyres, one straight that creates passes — produces the lead changes our race pages count.
Because the WEC visited across two very different eras here, Shanghai is one of the better places to compare LMP1 hybrids directly against Hypercars on the same layout.