SHANGHAI: Lewis Hamilton sealed his first hat-trick of Formula One wins, leading from start to finish to win Sunday’s Chinese Grand Prix ahead of team-mate Nico Rosberg as a dominant Mercedes claimed a third straight one-two finish.

The win was the 25th of Hamilton’s career and drew him level with British legend Jim Clark and his current Mercedes boss, triple world champion Niki Lauda, in the all-time winner’s list.

“This is a team on a roll, that’s for sure,” Hamilton said. “I’m going to be working hard, we’re going to keep working hard because obviously the others are pushing to catch us.”

The former world champion got away smoothly from pole and was rarely troubled as he finished 19 seconds ahead of Rosberg.

Fernando Alonso, winner of last year’s race in China, held off fast-charging Red Bull driver Daniel Ricciardo and finished third to give Ferrari their first podium of the season and the first under new boss Marco Mattiacci, who looked on from the pitwall.

Ricciardo was fourth, finishing one place ahead of teammate Sebastian Vettel after the four-time defending world champion was asked by his team to allow the faster Ricciardo to pass for the second race in a row with the Force India of Nico Hulkenberg coming home in sixth.

Hamilton had a huge grin as he celebrated his victory but despite consecutive wins in Malaysia, Bahrain and now China, the Briton, on 75 points, still trails Rosberg by four points in the standings as he seeks to regain his 2008 world title.

“I just can’t believe how amazing the car is,” said Hamilton, who punched the air with both fists after parking up and leaping out.

Rosberg retained his championship lead with a dogged second place after fighting past the Red Bulls and Alonso despite telemetry problems and an early bump with the Williams of Valtteri Bottas.

“It was just very close,” Rosberg said of the first corner contact with Bottas. “There were cars all over the place and just had a bit of contact there and was grateful that my car held on.”

For Ferrari, their first podium of the season was sweetly timed for new team principal Mattiacci, who replaced Stefano Domenicali this week.

“Being here on the podium is some kind of surprise for us, it’s a nice surprise finally,” Alonso said. “[I’m] happy with the podium finish today, third in the drivers’ championship behind these two guys.”

Ricciardo maintained his early season edge over Vettel however the gloves came off in the battle between the two, with Vettel asked to let the faster Ricciardo through.

“What tyres is he on?” Vettel asked his team when instructed to let Ricciardo go past. When told that Ricciardo was on the same tyres as him, the 26-year-old responded by saying “tough luck.”

Red Bull team principal Christian Horner explained afterward that the team had different tyre strategies for the drivers, planning a two-stop race for Ricciardo and a three-stop race for Vettel.

“As soon as [Vettel] understood that, he immediately let him through,” he said. “You could see he simply didn’t have the pace to hold him back there. It was pointless.”

After four races out of 19, Mercedes already have a stranglehold on the constructors’ standings with 154 points, 97 more than second-placed Red Bull.

Force India had both its drivers finish in the points with Hulkenberg sixth and Sergio Perez taking ninth. The Silverstone-based team dropped a place in the constructors’ standings to Red Bull, but are still an impressive third ahead of Ferrari.

Williams were once again left to ponder what might have been after failing to make the most of a strong qualifying result.

Bottas scored the team’s only points in seventh, while Felipe Massa’s race was ruined by a collision with Alonso’s Ferrari at the start and a lengthy first stop as his crew struggled to change his left-rear tyre.

Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen was eighth, and Toro Rosso’s Daniil Kyvat finished in 10th in another impressive showing by the 19-year-old debutant.

And there was more woe for McLaren when both Jenson Button and Kevin Magnussen finished out of the points.