Liam Lawson charged into view on his first flying lap of the Chinese Grand Prix weekend. For an instant, he looked prodigiously fast thanks to his speed on turn-in for Turn 3 - to the eye faster than Red Bull Formula 1 team-mate Max Verstappen.
What followed proved the New Zealander faced a tough weekend, so it was no surprise to stand at the same spot a few hours later to watch him not only eliminated in SQ1, but also slowest.
On that first flier, he paid the price for the speed he carried at turn in. Although he got the nose in, the attempt to feed the throttle in gently while under-rotated and wider than ideal led to a quick snap that sent him briefly through the gravel.
There were mitigating factors, notably having to work his way around a Sauber through the Turn 1-2 double right-hander, with several moments likely spiking the rear tyre temperature, but everything about the car's body language spoke of a driver forcing the issue to shortcut the learning process.
Thereafter, he was much more conservative, and although he justifiably said that the early off didn't put him on the back foot - "no, not that early in the session" - that it happened was symptomatic of his troubles.
The moment had echoes of Verstappen team-mates past, notably Pierre Gasly's late-braking attempts leading to the car being under-rotated and what he interpreted as a lack of traction at exit due to having more lock on, and Sergio Perez's attempts to hit the ground running Verstappen-style that led to his infamous crash on his first flying lap of the Hungaroring weekend back in 2023 after dropping a wheel. When Verstappen is your benchmark, life is difficult.
Things looked up on the first runs in sprint qualifying. Lawson lapped four tenths off Verstappen despite struggling again at Turn 3 compared to his team-mate, failing to get the car turned and then finding himself wide and under-rotated in the exit phase. At a corner with a wide variety of lines, he was at the far end of the spectrum.
That led to a brief wobble on the throttle. That first lap put him 12th, and he had a similar trajectory through Turn 3 on his second attempt, although his chances of improving were ruined by a wide moment on the exit kerb in the middle of the Turn 9/10 double-left. Inexperience again hindered him on that final lap, as he hadn't cooled the tyres enough and paid the price with reduced grip.
"From a starting point it wasn't too bad," said Lawson. "The first lap was all right, and then we were just looking to build on there. But we stayed out to try and cool the tyres on track and, to be honest, I really struggled to get the temps down starting the second lap. We started too hot and then through the lap, I just struggled. It's frustrating."
As Lawson said, "our pace should be a lot further up than where we are". He likely would have made SQ2 had he got the second lap in, although making SQ3 would have required some bigger steps.
The bottom line is that he's battling inexperience, not helped by this being his first time at the Shanghai International Circuit in F1 - although he did race there in Asian F3 back in September 2018.
On Thursday, I asked Lawson where he felt he was with the car after setting aside the various interruptions to his progress - notably the lost track time on day two in the Bahrain test and the problem that ruined FP3 in Australia. The 23-year-old clung to that, with some justification, for not yet being anywhere near Verstappen's pace.
"Each day I drive the car, I get more comfortable," said Lawson. "We didn't have a super-clean test in Bahrain and we had some difficulties in practice in Melbourne; that's really your prep for the weekend, it's where you learn and adjust to everything.
"Having one [practice session] this weekend will be tough, but we'll all be dealing with the same thing. It's how you maximise those practice sessions because you don't want to go into a qualifying session or race feeling like there's something unknown that you haven't discovered yet, which I feel like Melbourne was a little like."
As Friday in Shanghai showed, there's limited opportunity to catch up. The step in pace he made to the first run in SQ1 shows there is progress and with a normal run through three free practice sessions he would certainly have done better. The trouble is, Lawson is having to do everything in double-quick time. And he has to do so with such limited experience prior to this season.
You can tell when drivers are comfortable, confident and cohere with the machinery. Lawson isn't there yet, which inevitably piles on the pressure. What will be revealing is how he recovers on Saturday, using the sprint as a learning experience then hopefully going into qualifying proper having made the most of the experience.
It's a big ask, especially if he's trying to push himself to do what Verstappen can do. Expectations are sky-high, which won't help, but given one of the main reasons Red Bull promoted him was his mental robustness, with resilience and patience from the team there is plenty of time to turn things around. And that's the key word: time.
