Lewis Hamilton produced an impeccable performance in the Chinese Grand Prix to stretch his drivers' championship lead to seven points with one race remaining.

The McLaren driver had a chance to win the title in Shanghai, but Ferrari's Felipe Massa made sure that the world championship would be decided in Brazil, his home country, in a fortnight's time after finishing in second place.

Kimi Raikonnen, Massa's team-mate, took third with Renault's Fernando Alonso in fourth. BMW Sauber's Nick Heidfeld finished fifth ahead of his team-mate Robert Kubica, the only other title contender, who finished sixth to end his slim championship hopes.

Hamilton, 23, is bidding to become both the youngest and the first black driver to win the world championship. He threw away a commanding lead in the standings in his rookie season, but is looking forward to making amends at Interlagos where a fifth-place finish at least would guarantee him the title. "This is a completely different situation to last year," he said. "Brazil will be very different this time."

The Briton will have silenced some of his detractors with a convincing display of smooth front-running. Hamilton avoided the fireworks seen at the start of the Japan Grand Prix last week in a clean start from pole position, followed by Raikkonen and Massa. He then produced a succession of fastest laps to establish a lead that he extended with comfort as Ferrari seemed to struggle with the softer tyres in the first sector of the race.

By the time the leaders began making their first pit-stops, Hamilton led by more than four seconds ahead of Raikkonen followed by Massa, Alonso and McLaren's Heikki Kovalainen.

Massa was the first to pit, but continued with his choice of softer tyres, after 14 laps. He was joined by Alonso and then Hamilton and Raikkonen came in after lap 15. This left Kovalainen, celebrating his 27th birthday, in the lead for a brief period before he also pitted and Hamilton took command again with Raikkonen second but stuck behind Toro Rosso's heavily-laden Sebastien Vettel.

Out after a swift stop in which he reduced his front wing setting slightly to counter over-steer, Hamilton flew and delivered several rapid laps that extended his advantage to more than seven seconds.

When Vettel pitted, Raikkonen pressed on to cut into Hamilton's lead, but Massa, third, was unable to make much impression. Hamilton's advantage was cut from 7.2 seconds to 6.4 seconds over three laps to lap 28. But he pulled some of that back before the second round of stops led by Alonso on lap 36. Hamilton led by 8.9 seconds when he and Raikkonen pitted together at the end of lap 38.

By then, unfortunately for McLaren, Kovalainen had already been forced to come in with a front right wheel puncture that effectively ended his hopes of a good finish.

On exit, Hamilton led ahead of Heidfeld's BMW Sauber with Raikkonen third, a buffer that was sure to delay Ferrari's charge in the closing laps.

Hamilton remained unchallenged at the front with a 13-second lead and it was left to the Ferrari team to swap places after 49 laps when Raikkonen slowed enough to let Massa pass him on the back straight.

Results from Chinese Grand Prix:

1. Lewis Hamilton (GBR) McLaren 1hr 31min 57.403sec, 2. Felipe Massa (BRA) Ferrari at 14.925s, 3. Kimi Raikkonen (FIN) Ferrari 16.445, 4. Fernando Alonso (ESP) Renault 18.370, 5. Nick Heidfeld (GER) BMW Sauber 28.923, 6. Robert Kubica (POL) BMW Sauber 33.219, 7. Timo Glock (GER) Toyota 41.722, 8. Nelson Piquet Jr (BRA) Renault 56.645, 9. Sebastian Vettel (GER) Toro Rosso 1:04.339, 10. David Coulthard (GBR) Red Bull 1:14.842, 11. Rubens Barrichello (BRA) Honda 1:25.061, 12. Kazuki Nakajima (JPN) Williams 1:30.847, 13. Sebastien Bourdais (FRA) Toro Rosso 1:31.457, 14. Mark Webber (AUS) Red Bull 1:32.422, 15. Nico Rosberg (GER) Williams 1 lap, 16. Jenson Button (GBR) Honda 1 lap, 17. Giancarlo Fisichella (ITA) Force India 1 lap

Retirements: Jarno Trulli (ITA) Toyota 3rd lap, Adrian Sutil (GER) Force India engine 14th lap, Heikki Kovalainen (FIN) McLaren 50th lap

Overall standings

Drivers

1. Lewis Hamilton (GBR) 94pts, 2. Felipe Massa (BRA) 87, 3. Robert Kubica (POL) 75, 4. Kimi Raikkonen (FIN) 69, 5. Nick Heidfeld (GER) 60, 6. Fernando Alonso (ESP) 53, 7. Heikki Kovalainen (FIN) 51, 8. Sebastian Vettel (GER) 30, 9. Jarno Trulli (ITA) 30, 10. Timo Glock (GER) 22, 11. Mark Webber (AUS) 21, 12. Nelson Piquet Jr (BRA) 19, 13. Nico Rosberg (GER) 17, 14. Rubens Barrichello (BRA) 11, 15. Kazuki Nakajima (JPN) 9, 16. David Coulthard (GBR) 8, 17. Sebastien Bourdais (FRA) 4, 18. Jenson Button (GBR) 3

Constructors

1. Ferrari 156pts, 2. McLaren 145, 3. BMW Sauber 135, 4. Renault 72, 5. Toyota 52, 6. Toro Rosso 34, 7. Red Bull 29, 8. Williams 26, 9. Honda 14