The Italians cheer on Ferrari at Monza and Imola. In the previous race, Yuki Tsunoda was being cheered on by thousands of fans at Suzuka in his home race and now it’s Zhou Guanyu’s time, who returned to China for the Chinese GP, his home race, and it was rightfully an emotional affair for both the fans and the Chinese driver.

The Chinese GP made its return to the F1 calendar after being out for five years. The Chinese fans, super passionate about the sport, showed up at the track in huge numbers. In fact, when the tickets went online for the sale, the site crashed because of the huge amount of traffic. And every single one of them was here this weekend to support Zhou Guanyu, who returned to his country after leaving it as a child. 

Europe is the hub of motorsports and the place with the most facilities for someone who wants to become a professional racing driver. Zhou Guanyu, who was born in Shanghai, left his country when he was just eight years old and moved to Sheffield in the UK for competitive karting. He soon moved towards the junior Formula categories and made his way up to F1 when he was signed by Alfa Romeo [now Kick Sauber] in 2022. Subsequently, Guanyu became the first Chinese driver to compete in F1.

Unfortunately, F1 did not take place in China in 2022 or 2023, but this year it did, which enabled the Chinese driver to race in front of his home crowd for the first time. After the Chinese GP ended, a special spot was reserved for the Chinese driver on the grid, right behind the podium finishers. As Zhou Guanyu parked his car and got out of it, he was met with a massive cheer from the fans in the grandstands. Seeing his home crowd cheering him, despite him only finishing P14, Zhou got super emotional and broke down into tears. 

Nonetheless, it was a great weekend for the Sauber teams compared to the other races that they’ve had this season.

Zhou Guanyu’s Race Weekend in Shanghai

Zhou Guanyu’s weekend started off by taking his teammate Valtteri Bottas around the town. In a special F1 feature, we saw Zhou and Bottas walking around the city with the Chinese driver showing him his favorite spots, with the duo trying tea and snacks and chatting together. Coming to the on-track action, Sauber looked good during the only practice session and then surprised everyone as both cars made it to SQ3 during the sprint qualifying. 

The Shanghai-born had a great Sprint qualifying and race, reaching the Q3 in Sprint Qualifying and finishing P9 in the Sprint race, just short of the points. Although Guanyu had a disappointing qualifying and qualified only P16, he finished the race P14, after being P19 after the first lap. Every move made by the Sauber driver was cheered on by the fans. Notably, Sauber did not have the pitstop troubles they’d been battling having since the start of the season, making the race even more successful.

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All in all, it was definitely a day to remember for Zhou Guanyu!