Lando Norris wins the Singapore GP starting from pole position: the Englishman shatters what could have seemed like a curse. It is the third success of the season for Lando who arrived at the checkered flag “cooked” by the heat, so much so that, with an advantage that had reached almost half a minute, he grazed the barriers twice on lap 29 and then on lap 48.
The track engineer urged him more than once to stay focused and drink, seeing a significant drop in performance in the final laps. Lando suffered a physical decline, but held firm, closing an important weekend in a positive way. Norris only missed the “icing”, namely the fastest lap of the race. McLaren lost him on the last lap, when the Red Bull system gave a gift to Daniel Ricciardo, almost certainly at his last GP, who was called to the pits to fit a set of soft tyres. The Australian with 1’34″486 took the additional point away from Lando, although without adding it to his personal score because he finished 17th, outside the top ten.
This point is important because if Lando had achieved it he could have won by relying only on his own strengths regardless of Verstappen’s positions: McLaren has shown a disarming technical superiority, also bringing Oscar Piastri to the podium, but Max Verstappen can defend his leadership with a 52-point advantage. Red Bull was not able to challenge the papaya car, but showed an incredible leap in quality with the three-time world champion.
The Milton Keynes team sees the gap grow in the Constructors (now 41 points), but in the Drivers the game remains wide open. Lando, despite feeling dizzy after the finish line and appearing exhausted to lift the winner’s trophy, is finally aware that he has what it takes to aim for the big target.
Outside the podium is George Russell: last year he crashed at the end, opening the way for Carlos Sainz to win, but this year in the Marina Bay sauna, he was very good, even though exhausted by the heat (like Norris, he opened his visor and stuck his hands out of the cockpit on the straight) he managed to contain Charles Leclerc’s attack.
The Englishman achieved the maximum result, while Lewis Hamilton, who started on the softs (like Ricciardo), had to surrender to an unsatisfactory sixth place. Ferrari paid dearly for the poor qualifying, but Charles Leclerc was consistent in climbing from ninth to fifth place. The placing certainly does not satisfy the ambitions of the Prancing Horse, but the pace seen in the race was positive, so much so that at a certain point the Monegasque was the only one able to keep up with Lando in the second part of the race.
The Scuderia spoils another opportunity to stand out, but perhaps there was little to do against this McLaren, but it finds confirmation that the SF-24 package is consistent to fight at the top. The red team has the right regret for having left important points on the road. Carlos Sainz, in addition to the crash on the launch lap in Q3, paid for a terrible start: on the first lap he was 12th and managed with a good strategy to climb up to seventh place. He did his part to erase a start to forget.
Fernando Alonso, with eighth place, moves Aston Martin up the Constructors’ standings, consolidating their fifth place, while Nico Hulkenberg, with ninth place, brings Haas to within just three points of Racing Bulls, who remain empty-handed in the fourth race, although the Faenza team bet on a set of soft tyres for Yuki Tsunoda, who instead finished 12th.
The top 10 was completed by an exhausted Sergio Perez who was unable to drink in the toughest race of the season. Franco Colapinto with Williams came close to scoring: the Argentinean boy is more consistent than he might have seemed, overshadowing Alexander Albon who was forced to retire.
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