Giles Richards’s report:
Right, that’s us for the afternoon/evening, after one of the races of the season, a rare interlude from the Red Bull procession. The title will still be theirs and Verstappen’s but here was a proper, gripping race in which any one of five drivers could have won it going into the last few laps. Doesn’t happen often enough, that. Hats off to Carlos Sainz for holding on under considerable pressure, and to Lando Norris, Lewis Hamilton and the luckless George Russell for making such a race of it.
Giles Richards’s race report will be up on the site imminently, so hang around for that, and thanks for following. Bye.
Now it’s time for the anthems. This, by the way, has been McLaren’s best grand prix for more than a decade, since Jenson Button’s heyday.
Those placings in full
1 Carlos Sainz (25pts)
2 Lando Norris (18)
3 Lewis Hamilton (16)
4 Charles Leclerc (12)
5 Max Verstappen (10)
6 Pierre Gasly (8)
7 Oscar Piastri (6)
8 Sergio Pérez (4)
9 Liam Lawson (2)
10 Kevin Magnussen (1)
11 Alexander Albon
12 Zhou Guanya
13 Nico Hulkenburg
14 Login Sargeant
15 Fernando Alonso
DNF: George Russell, Valtteri Bottas, Esteban Ocon, Yuki Tsunoda, Lance Stroll
Sainz speaks: “It’s an incredible feeling, an incredible weekend. I want to thank everyone in Ferrari for a huge effort to turn things round, we did everything right. It was all about knowing our limitations managing the race, making sure I made it to target lap [for pitting] I didn’t want to give George a safety car and medium tyre opportunity and giving Lando the DRS opportunity was important. I always felt I had the headspace and felt I could manage well and we brought it home.”
Lando Norris returns the compliment, praising Sainz’s “generosity” while Hamilton says a hard, competitive race is “how it should be”.
Updated
Drives from pole don’t come much more challenging than that, but Sainz, helped by his teammate-not-teammate Norris at the end, put in a nerveless drive to hold off a resurgent Mercedes pair and end Red Bull’s winning streak. Norris is second, with Hamilton finishing third.
Talking of which, Verstappen came in fifth behind Leclerc in the end. George Russell is out of his car safely but he must be devastated at not making the podium in a race he fancied winning.
Updated
Carlos Sainz wins the Singapore grand prix!
Hamilton’s going for the podium but Russell is not yielding, as Sainz keeps Norris at bay at the front. Meanwhile Verstappen closes on Leclerc in fifth, and Russell hits the barriers and is out trying one last move! Heartache. Meanwhile, Sainz keeps his cool, Norris can’t strike and Sainz has a richly deserved win for Ferrari.
LAP 62/62
— Formula 1 (@F1) September 17, 2023
"Aggggghhhhhh, no, no!!!!"
Russell is into the barriers and out! #F1 #SingaporeGP pic.twitter.com/4h8ybvTy1F
Updated
Lap 61/62: Sainz and Norris are now in a slightly stronger position, as Norris still benefits from Sainz’s slipstream, having helped him out in fending off that Russell attack. A note of frustration for Mercedes now. 1 Sainz 2 Norris 3 Russell 4 Hamilton
Lap 60/62: A hell of a tussle between Norris and Russell as they go into lap 60, Russell trying to pass on both side but Norris finding the DRS to stay just in front. This helps Sainz who can get a bit of distance on his pursuers. This is gripping stuff.
Lap 59/62: The gap is only 1.7sec among the top four – this is extraordinary, as a yellow flag goes up for Albon stopping, but he resumes and we’re spared the safety car. Sainz moans that his front tyres are finished. Can he limp over the line here?
Lap 58/62: Norris has DRS range on Sainz, forcing Sainz to put his foot down a bit more, but ooh this is close. Those Mercedes cars look ever more likely, particularly on corners …
Lap 57/62: Leclerc complains that his right rear tyre has gone – nerves fraying everywhere for Ferrari, as Verstappen attacks Gasly and passes him on the outside to take sixth place with five to go.
Lap 56/62: Sainz leads by just 1.1sec now from Norris, Russell and Hamilton. Less than five seconds separate them.
Lap 55/62: Hamilton set a fastest lap just there by the way. Can they reel Sainz in in the seven remaining laps of this gripping race? Russell closes in on Norris, who in his turn is closing on Sainz. Bottas is out of the race too by the way after that malfunction a couple of laps back.
Updated
Lap 54/62: Hamilton passes Leclerc too, slapping on the DRS and going round his outside effortlessly! This tyre change has worked a dream, and Sainz is now separated from his teammate. He still leads though, by 1.2sec from Norris, with Russell third. Verstappen goes up to seventh, but is 37 seconds off the lead.
Lap 53/62: Russell sizes up an overtake of Leclerc on the straight, but can’t quite do it, but come turn 14 he does him on the bend at the second attempt. Hamilton too is closing on Leclerc. Bottas pulls off the track, as the yellow flag briefly goes up.
Lap 52/62: Another feisty battle in midfield is that between 1oth-placed Hulkenburg and Zhou, who’s been closing in on that top 10 slot these past few laps, as Hamilton makes a bit of ground on Russell, who’s ever closer to Leclerc
Lap 51/62: The New Zealander Liam Lawson is having quite the race, duelling with Verstappen for eighth, and eyeing his first F1 points. He can’t overhaul the great champion but is giving him plenty to think about. Sainz leads by 1.5sec from Norris. Leclerc third and Russell and Hamilton coiled to spring in fourth and fifth.
Lap 49/62: Russell and Hamilton’s astute virtual safety car pitting has perhaps made them favourites to hit the front. They’re still fourth and fifth respectively but have time and tyres sufficient to catch the leader, Sainz. Russell is only 12 seconds off the lead – doable.
Lap 48/62: Verstappen watch: the Dutchman is progressing up the field, passing Zhou with ease to move back into the top 10. Fernando Alonso was yellow-flagged in the previous lap by the way as he came off the track, but continues.
Lap 47/62: Sainz now has the job of his season on to take this car through to the finish, with Mercedes on his tail. He leads by 1.8sec from Norris and then Leclerc as fourth-placed Russell sets a new fastest lap in 1:36.
And the virtual safety car period ends.
Lap 46/62: Alonso, with a five-second penalty, pits, goes onto softs, takes too long and comes out in 14th. The top five now reads 1 Sainz 2 Norris 3 Leclerc 4 Russell 5 Hamilton – but those Mercedes now have striking advantage with those fresh medium compound tyres. We have a serious finish in prospect here.
Updated
Lap 45/62: Albon seems to have been the only driver to have pitted initially – oh, and here comes Magnussen into the pits too. As confirmation comes through that Ocon’s race is over. His Alpine teammate Gasly is up to seventh.
Ooh, and now Mercedes pit both their drivers to put on brand new mediums!
Virtual safety car
Lap 44/62: On lap 43, heartache for Ocon, who pulls up with smoke seeping out the engine, having driven so well. The virtual safety car comes in, but the leaders pass the pit lane before getting the message.
Lap 43/62: So here’s how they now stand: 1 Sainz 2 Russell 3 Norris 4 Hamilton 5 Leclerc 6 Ocon 7 Alonso 8 Gasly 9 Piastri 10 Hulkenburg
Lap 42/62: Whatever else, it’s great to go into the last third of a race with it still well in the balance. Sainz has held his lead throughout but any one of the current top five could nick it – all have shown the verve and the appetite.
Lap 41/62: Verstappen pits, comes out in mediums and in 16th place ahead of Bottas, who becomes the last driver to pit. The Red Bulls have some clear road ahead of them now but a hell of a lot of ground to make up
Lap 40/62: Perez pits, not before time, into medium tyres with 22 laps to go, and he comes out in 18th. He could well end up pointless here. Verstappen’s coming in next.
Sainz’s lead is cut by Russell to 0.7sec.
Lap 39/62: Ocon’s having a great little drive and he outmuscles Perez to take his seventh place. Perez is having a torrid time.
Lap 38/62: Sainz continues to control the race brilliantly, not burning rubber but keeping that gap manageable. Red Bull’s hopes now rest on another safety car coming out.
Lap 37/62: A three-way tear up between Alonso, Ocon and Perez – Alonso goes first but then here comes Ocon to the outside, which serves to reprieve Perez who can forge ahead to reassert his seventh, with Ocon eighth and Alonso ninth.
And Russell has cut the gap on Sainz to 0.6sec
Lap 36/62: Magnussen is now toiling – passed by his teammate Hulkenburg and Ocon; his points hopes in ruins. Sainz leads by 0.9sec as Perez continues to struggle too as he strains to keep ninth-placed Alonso at bay.
Lap 35/62: Pierre Gasly, grievance or no, slips round the outside of Magnussen to take that top 10 place, but, next corner, Magnussen gets it back.
Lap 34/62: Pierre Gasly and Kevin Magnussen are engaged in an absorbing battle for 10th, and points, with Gasly on his wheels but Magnussen defending gamely, though there’s a suggestion he forced Gasly off track. Gasly, 0.4sec behind, is not happy.
Lap 33/62: Hamilton has a podium finish in sights, within striking range of Lando Norris but the latter is keeping him at bay well in third place at the minute. Sainz leads by around a second.
Lap 31/62: How they stand update: 1 Sainz 2 Russell 3 Norris 4 Hamilton 5 Leclerc 6 Verstappen 7 Perez 8 Alonso 9 Ocon 10 Magnussen.
Verstappen fact: this race is the first in which he’s been overtaken all season.
Lap 30/62: Sainz’s tactics are compared on Sky comms to a football team parking the bus with a 1-0 lead. But it’s working for him and Ferrari at the moment, though that defensive unit needs fifth-placed Leclerc further up the road, and Hamilton is having none of that in fourth. Two and a half seconds are all that split the top four.
Lap 29/62: Alonso goes way off track attempting an overtake but e didn’t gain a place and went the right side of the bollard – he remains eighth and he’s now in a real battle to fend off Ocon. Sainz leads by around 1.2sec from Russell.
Lap 28/62: Leclerc now nudges himself in front of Verstappen to move back into the top five. That long winning RB run could well be over. It’s not happening for them.
Lap 27/62: More woe for Verstappen, as Hamilton zips by him and gets a decent lead on him. Sainz’s lead is 0.7sec on Russell, with Norris a way back in third. Sainz is without his teammate Leclerc, who’s back in sixth after his pitstop calamity.
Updated
Lap 26/62: Hamilton has that last lap track time deleted for going off track. Perez thinks it should be given back. And Russell’s really in the mood, as earlier bullish exchanges with his team on the radio demonstrated.
Right, here’s the current placings: 1 Sainz 2 Russell 3 Norris 4 Verstappen 5 Hamilton 6 Leclerc 7 Perez 8 Alonso 9 Ocon 10 Magnussen
Lap 25/62: It’s all happening. Hamilton takes on Perez, veers off track, and passes him as Red Bull struggle with the old tyres. The stewards will have a look at it. And Norris passes Verstappen, to give us two British drivers in the podium slots.
Updated
Lap 24/62: Norris takes on Perez, can’t do it, but the pressure is on the Red Bull man, and this time Norris does pass im at the second place, and Russell overhauls Verstappen, those new tyres kicking in.
Lap 23/62: The safety car ends. Singapore’s record of the safety car coming out in each of its GPs continues. Sainz zips away quickly to reassert his lead.
Lap 22/62: Right, so with the safety car still out and a number of drivers tyre-changing, here’s the scores on the doors:
1 Sainz 2 Verstappen 3 Russell 4 Pérez 5 Norris 6 Lecerc 7 Hamilton 8 Alonso 9 Ocon 10 Bottas. All drivers in the whole field have pitted except the Red Bull pair and Bottas
Updated
Lap 21/62: Leclerc is delayed coming out of the pit lane, as Ferrari overplay – he’s facing a penalty for backing up the pack. Sainz, however, is out front too, as Russell, Norris and Hamilton also pit. I’ll update the positions in a sec.
Updated
Lap 20/62: Safety car deployed Sargent has to pit, and out comes the car, and Ferrari consequently prepare to change tyes. In comes Leclerc and Sainz.
Lap 19/62: Sainz now leads by 3.5sec from Leclerc. Meanwhile Sargent’s car has sustained damage withi bits of debris coming off the wing after he collided with the barriers. We could get a safety car here as bits of carbon fibre fly about
And here’s that start again …
The two Ferraris get a perfect start 👌
— Formula 1 (@F1) September 17, 2023
Hamilton runs wide at Turn 1 🔀
Watch the race start at Marina Bay! 🎞️#F1 #SingaporeGP https://t.co/gdm9op7Ms9
Lap 18/62: Russell is told “we need to keep the pressure on these Ferraris” as he seeks tactical guidance over the radio. And we’re told a brief rain shower is approaching in five minutes or so, which should shake things up.
Lap 17/62: Sainz has set another new fastest lap to edge his lead over Leclerc up to 2.4sec. But it’s still too tight to pit. Sainz would come out in 17th if he did at the moment.
Lap 16/62: Ferrari’s pace management from the front is making it hard for cars to pit. Leclerc now has the fastest lap. He’s second, 2.2sec or so behind Sainz.
Updated
Lap 15/62: Leclerc now feels a challenge from Russell now, revitalised after an iffy start to the race.The front five are unchanged now. Verstappen, meanwhile, despite being cautioned to slow it down a tad, is doing nothing of the sort. He’s still eighth
Lap 14/62: Leclerc drops back a bit on Sainz, but Hamilton is creeping up on McLaren’s Norris. An attack could be imminent. It looks as if the field generally are going to go a long way on their current tyres.
Lap 13/62: Leclerc gains half a second or so on Sainz, heating up the intra-Ferrari battle out front.
Lap 12/62: If Ferrari’s plan is to keep rivals at at least three seconds behind the lead, then it’s currently going swimmingly. Verstappen, mind, is less than 10 seconds off the lead, though his team are warning him not to bust too much of a gut at this stage.
Lap 11/62: How they stand: 1 Sainz 2 Leclerc 3 Russell 4 Norris 5 Hamilton 6 Alonso 7 Ocon 8 Verstappen – they’re all still pretty tightly bunched, which mitigates against early pitting opportunities.
Lap 10/62: The narrowness of the circuit is palpable, particularly when the cameras switch to an overhead view. Sainz now leads by around 1.3 sec. He held his lead for 14 laps in Monza, can he go better now?
He also has the fastest lap
Updated
Lap 9/62: Ferrari will be pleased with the growing gap between their pair and George Russell in third. The other two Mercedes are tucked in behind him.
Lap 8/62: RedBull might be heartened by Verstappen’s display so far, but Perez is making no impact in front of him, stuck in 13 and with Haas’s pair of Hulkenburg and Magnussen driving tight races.
Lap 7/62: Leclerc in second is opening a gap on Russell in third and has Sainz within reach, 0.92sec ahead out front.
Lap 6/62: Magnussen v Verstappen looks a feisty battle, Magnussen holding the champion off initially, but then he gets him on the inside by the bridge. He’s not used to this sort of traffic but the Dutch master is cooking.
Lap 5/62: Phew. Time for a how-they-stand: 1 Sainz, by 0.9ish sec 2 Leclerc 3 Russell 4 Norris 5 Hamilton 6 Alonson 7 Ocon 8 Magnussen 9 Verstappen 10 Hulkenburg
Lap 4/62: Verstappen meanwhile has made up a couple of places, as Leclerc cuts the gap on Sainz to a second. What’s the team strategy here for Ferrari? Looking again at the start and Hamilton’s early overhauling of his teammates from an off-track position – it doesn’t look like he had any option, but he should let Norris through, and does. No further investigation
Updated
Tsunoda is out of the race
Lap 3/62: No movement from Tsunoda’s car, and his race is confirmed over. We’re down to 18 drivers. In the meantime, Sainz leads from Leclerc, Russell is back in front of Hamilton, while Norris is up to fifth.
Lap 2/62: Hamilton passed Russell off track, is he going to yield it? Tsunoda gets a yellow flag at turn 13 on the first lap. He’s not moving -– we could get a safety car here
Lap 1/62: It’s a Ferrari one-two already as Leclerc overhauls Russell straight away, and Hamilton passes Russell as well
Lights out and away we go!
Off we go then
They’re on the formation lap now, Sainz isn’t hanging about …
Tyre watch: Charles Leclerc is on soft, everyone else out front is on mediums, down to Verstappen and Perez who are on hard tyres – they’re looking to go long. A one-stop race is the general forecast.
A minute’s silence is observed for the victims of the Morocco earthquake and the floods in Libya. Impeccably so. (It was also good to see those tragic events observed at yesterday’s football matches)
“It’s so hot here,” says Alex Albon to Martin Brundle on the latter’s grid stroll. “I’m more used to it than some, but it’s still muggy.”
He grabs Verstappen, who admits: “We need a bit of luck throughout the race to pass cars, because you need a big space here. We’ll see, it’s a long race but we’ll see what happens I think we’re lacking a bit.”
Young Liam Lawson is in good spirits: “It was a good session yesterday but today’s the important one. It’s a very long race. I’m as ready as I can be.”
Verstappen was not a happy bunny with his car’s handling after qualifying yesterday: “I don’t know if you saw that, but that was shocking, absolutely shocking experience,” he harrumphed.
Giles Richards’s report on qualifying has more:
Talk among the Sky Sports commentariat about the slowness of the track and a general view that, even with a longer straight added to the circuit, overtaking will remain tricky. A challenge for Max under the street lights, time in Singapore currently being 7.17pm …
How they line up on the grid
Your runners and riders …
1 Carlos Sainz (Ferrari)
2 George Russell (Mercedes)
3 Charles Leclerc (Ferrari)
4 Lando Norris (McLaren)
5 Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes)
6 Kevin Magnussen (Haas)
7 Fernando Alonso (Aston Martin)
8 Esteban Ocon (Alpine)
9 Nico Hulkenberg (Haas)
10 Liam Lawson (Alpha Tauri)
11 Max Verstappen (Red Bull)
12 Pierre Gasly (Alpine)
13 Sergio Pérez (Red Bull)
14 Alexander Albon (Williams)
15 Yuki Tsunoda (Alpha Tauri)
16 Valtteri Bottas ((Alfa Romeo)
17 Oscar Piastri (McLaren) MCLAREN MERCEDES1:32.9029182
18 Logan Sargeant (Williams)
19 Zhou Guanyu (Alfa Romeo)
Preamble
Afternoon everyone, and welcome to what could be a rare collector’s item – a grand prix not won by Max Verstappen or Red Bull. The world champion and his teammate, Sergio Pérez, start way back in 11th and 13th respectively after all manner of engine dissatisfaction yesterday as they failed to put a car into Q3. On a tight street circuit such as Marina Bay, at which the safety car is usually deployed at some point, hauling his way to the front could be a task beyond even Verstappen – though Fernando Alonso won from 15th here in 2008.
But it gives the others a chance, prime among them Carlos Sainz. The Ferrari driver sits in pole for the second race in a row and comes into today’s race on the back of a fine, tenacious drive for third place in Monza a fortnight ago, while George Russell in second leads British podium hopes, with Lando Norris (fourth) and Lewis Hamilton (fifth) in the mix.
Some disappointing news overnight though: Lance Stroll is out of the race following his high-impact crash in qualifying. It was initially hoped the Canadian might be able to compete after he was passed fit at trackside but he continued to suffer some after-effects overnight, so Stroll and Aston Martin have agreed to sit it out.
Lights out: 1pm BST
