Rosberg maintains his winning sequence for Mercedes

Nico Rosberg raced to his third victory of 2016

It was a second victory at the Shanghai International Circuit, four years after sealing his first Formula 1 win at the same venue for the Mercedes AMG Petronas driver.

Brackley team-mate Lewis Hamilton produced a battling drive to finish seventh from the back of the grid despite incurring significant damage to his car in a first lap incident

Rosberg said: “It’s been a fantastic few days for me here in China.

“I’ve never had a better balance in my car than I had today. After three races I can be really pleased about how my season has gone so far.

“But it’s a very long year ahead and there are a lot of points still on the table, so I’m not losing my focus. Now I look forward to Russia, where I started my good run of qualifying results last year. Hopefully I can get on a nice run like that again.”

Hamilton added: “That was definitely a difficult weekend. I got a good start but it’s always tricky being at the back and trying not to get caught up in the domino effect of any contact at the first corner.

“I tried to avoid whatever happened in front of me but I just got tangled up in it. It was just a bit unfortunate, really. From there it was always going to be a battle, I gave it everything I had and seventh was about the limit.”