Round 16/23: Review of the Singapore Grand Prix

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Carlos Sainz won the Singapore Grand Prix, his second Formula 1 victory, with a technical masterclass by holding two charging Mercedes towards the end of the race. The Spaniard showed great composure and tactical awareness as he dished DRS advantage to the McLaren of Lando Norris in P2 to keep both the Mercedes from challenging him. Norris finished P2 while Lewis Hamilton finished in P3 as George Russel crashed in the final stages of the race, not reaping the benefits of an impressive performance shown throughout the week.

Most of the race was about Sainz setting up the pace at the front, and managing his tires as overtaking proved to be nearly impossible on similar tires. This was until, the engine in the Alpine of Esteban Ocon failed on lap 43, leading to him parking his car on track bringing out the virtual safety car (VSC). Russell in P2 and Hamilton in P4 were asked to pit under the VSC onto new mediums leading to their late charge against the Ferraris and the McLaren of Lando Norris. In the end, they could only overtake the Ferrari of Charles Leclerc but couldn’t manage to overtake Norris as Sainz played his cards perfectly in the end.

The race started with everyone on Mediums except Leclerc on Softs while the trio of Max Verstappen, Sergio Perez, and Valtteri Bottas on Hards. Both the Ferraris got away well, with Leclerc taking P2 ahead of Russell while Hamilton shot wide in Lap 1 gaining an unfair advantage of the track as he overtook Russell and Norris. However, he returned the positions gained while Yuki Tsunoda in the Alphatauri had another disaster as he had to stop on Lap 1 due to a puncture. It is not clear, why the Japanese driver had not opted to pit for a change of tires.

The Redbulls were hoping for an extended stint on their hard tires with clean air when everyone else pits, possibly making up positions and overcutting the competition. Verstappen managed to gain a few positions with some impressive overtakes before getting stuck behind the Alpine of Esteban Ocon in P7. However, it was not to be for Redbull today as a safety car brought out by the crash of Logan Sargeant in the Williams gave the competition a chance to pit with minimal loss of time as Sainz kept his lead ahead of Verstappen even after his pitstop.

Once, the safety car was in, the Redbulls were easy targets for everyone on brand-new hard tires as they quickly dropped to P6 and P7. Leclerc, meanwhile, had to experience a slow pitstop causing him to drop positions with traffic in the pitlane, only emerging P6 at the end of his pitstop. Earlier, he was advised repeatedly by Ferrari to keep his distance from Sainz maintaining a delta of 3 to 5 seconds to avoid any potential pitstop issues or undercuts from the Mercedes behind him.

Fernando Alonso and Esteban Ocon tried to attack Perez in P7 but it was Ocon who outfoxed both Alonso and Perez whilst they were fighting each other taking P7. Soon, Alonso too could overtake Perez and this caused the Redbulls to pit on Lap 40. Once, on fresher tires and after the VSC ended due to Ocon’s engine failure, it was Verstappen who started showing pace in the Redbull picking out driver after driver from P15 as he finished in P5 at the end of the race. Verstappen finished just 2 tenths behind Leclerc in P4 as he brought down 18 seconds of gap between the two cars in just 5 laps.

Pierre Gasly finished in P6 while Oscar Piastri finished in P7 after starting in P17, another impressive performance for the rookie. Perez finished in P8 even after taking a penalty of 5 seconds for causing a collision against Alex Albon in the Williams compromising his race as he finished in P11. Liam Lawson finished in P9 bringing home two points for Alphatauri and Kevin Magnussen in the Haas finished P10.

Position Driver Constructor Time Points
POS DRIVER CAR TIME/RETIRED PTS
1 Carlos Sainz FERRARI 01:46:37 25
2 Lando Norris MCLAREN MERCEDES +0.812s 18
3 Lewis Hamilton MERCEDES +1.269s 16
4 Charles Leclerc FERRARI +21.177s 12
5 Max Verstappen RED BULL RACING HONDA RBPT +21.441s 10
6 Pierre Gasly ALPINE RENAULT +38.441s 8
7 Oscar Piastri MCLAREN MERCEDES +41.479s 6
8 Sergio Perez RED BULL RACING HONDA RBPT +54.534s 4
9 Liam Lawson ALPHATAURI HONDA RBPT +65.918s 2
10 Kevin Magnussen HAAS FERRARI +72.116s 1
11 Alexander Albon WILLIAMS MERCEDES +73.417s 0
12 Zhou Guanyu ALFA ROMEO FERRARI +83.649s 0
13 Nico Hulkenberg HAAS FERRARI +86.201s 0
14 Logan Sargeant WILLIAMS MERCEDES +86.889s 0
15 Fernando Alonso ASTON MARTIN ARAMCO MERCEDES +87.603s 0
16 George Russell MERCEDES DNF 0
NC Valtteri Bottas ALFA ROMEO FERRARI DNF 0
NC Esteban Ocon ALPINE RENAULT DNF 0
NC Yuki Tsunoda ALPHATAURI HONDA RBPT DNF 0

References

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