SINGAPORE — Max Verstappen will make his 250th Formula 1 start from pole position at the Singapore Grand Prix after completing a perfect Saturday with victory in tricky wet conditions in the sprint and pole for Sunday's race. The Red Bull driver has the chance to secure a second grand prix victory within a week, with Ferrari pair Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton directly behind him after both felt pole had been possible, while McLaren endured a miserable day as team-mates Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris collided on the final lap of the sprint.
Verstappen, who has voiced concerns about Red Bull's inconsistent starts after losing the lead off the line in Malaysia last weekend and again in the Singapore sprint, knows overtaking is at a premium around Marina Bay and a slow getaway will be harder to recover. "It was a good qualifying," Verstappen said. "It was always very close and we got ahead when it mattered and we are very happy with that. All weekend the car has been in a good window and that makes it a lot easier to find your rhythm. Incredibly happy to start first. Still a long race ahead, a lot of things can go wrong but we have done everything up until now well so hopefully we can continue that tomorrow. It's been a really positive last few races and we want to keep that momentum going."
The upturn follows steady work from Red Bull to improve the car and put it into a window where Verstappen can predict its behaviour and push to the limit, building on a maiden win of the season in Malaysia last weekend that followed podium finishes in Italy, Spain and Azerbaijan — the last of which might have been a victory had qualifying problems not left him eighth on the grid when a front-row start had been possible. Last year Verstappen produced a remarkable second half of the season to eat into a 100-point deficit to the championship lead before missing a fifth title by just two points to McLaren and Norris. This time he is 129 points behind Mercedes' Kimi Antonelli with only 175 points still remaining, assuming the final races in Qatar and Abu Dhabi go ahead amid the war in the Middle East, a gap that would require a non-stop run of wins and highly unlikely misfortune for Antonelli to overturn.
If that margin leaves Antonelli comfortable, McLaren have greater cause for concern. The world champions, who enjoyed a purple patch in the summer when Norris won consecutively in Hungary and the Netherlands and would have won in Madrid but for the unfortunate timing of a virtual safety car, have slipped from competitiveness and lie third in the constructors' championship, only 11 points ahead of Red Bull. On Saturday they were heading for fourth and fifth in the sprint when Norris dived down the inside of Piastri at Turn Five on the final lap — not a common overtaking spot and, with Leclerc struggling ahead in third, a move with no collective reward on the last lap. The pair came together, pirouetted in tandem, Piastri into the barriers and out while Norris slipped to eighth, turning nine points into one. The stewards took no action, ruling that "both drivers had contributed to the incident".
Piastri told the hearing he had not expected Norris to attempt a move there but tried to leave space when he saw him, while Norris argued his car was in a position that entitled him to make an overtaking attempt and that he had braked and run over the kerb when it was not forthcoming. "There are two sides, one is what the stewards say and that's a fair reasoning, no-one's to blame," Norris said. "But I did apologise because it was still me attacking, as I had the right to do. If I just sat there and was boring like I should be, nothing would have happened. So really it's still my fault but I deserved to go for the space and I still believe I had the right for it." He added: "As you probably expect, no-one's very happy. I'm not happy, Oscar isn't happy." The incident followed McLaren's sprint disaster in Singapore and leaves the team needing a response on Sunday as Verstappen look to maintain their momentum at the front.