Sergio Perez has won the Singapore Grand Prix by two seconds ahead of Charles Leclerc but is under investigation for a safety car infringement. The Mexican had one of the best drivers of his career after getting a better start off the line to overtake the Ferrari at the start of the race.
Leclerc made a poor start in the second phase allowing Perez into the lead from the first corner from where he controlled the race. His only mistake being the infringement behind the safety car, where he looked to drop over ten car lengths behind before the final restart.
During the middle phase of the race, Perez edged away from Leclerc as the intermediate tyres wore down, but Leclerc was clearly quicker immediately after the final restart and started to pile on the pressure. While Leclerc got close at several points there wasn’t enough room to attempt a overtake.
That battle was ended when it looked as if Perez would get a five-second penalty, for not staying within ten car lengths of the safety car at the second restart after being warned about the same offence at the first one. He managed to build the gap, finishing 7.6secs behind, but the stewards will rule on the offence later.
Arguably it was one of the best races of Perez’s career, at the start and following every restart, he managed to pull away and open the gap over Leclerc. The Ferrari driver couldn’t take advantage of the undercut when switching to dry tyres he overshot his pit box losing time.
Perez was then able to stop without losing the lead when the VSC was deployed and the race shifted to a time limited race as the three-hour window closed in. the final nail in the Ferrari drivers hopes of catching Perez was a wobble which allowed the Red Bull driver to build a lead.
Carlos Sainz finished third, seven and a half seconds behind his teammate. The Spaniard driving a quiet and anonymous race to finish fifteen seconds off the lead after passing Lando Norris and Fernando Alonso at the start.
Perez said, “It was certainly my best performance, I controlled the race. The last few laps was so intense I didn’t feel it that much in the car but when I got out I felt it. I gave everything for the win today.”
Leclerc said, “Yeah I pushed all the way, the bad start set us on the back foot and after that it was really difficult to race after that. I had a little bit of wheelspin and lost the performance there.”
The race was one full of drama, following a delayed start the Mexican controlled the race and opened a second lead on Leclerc on the opening lap. Perez then went on to maintain that lead on the track to win, but could lose that if he gets a penalty for the infringements.
Norris brought his McLaren home fourth finishing over half a minute ahead of his teammate Daniel Ricciardo, which gives them a boost in the constructor’s championship fight with Alpine. The Australian, likely to be out of a drive at the end of the season after being dropped by McLaren, was running out of the points until the final safety car period, in which McLaren delayed his stop and he leapt up the field as a result.
The team was the benefactors from the mistakes made by Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton which saw both drops into the lower end of the top ten. McLaren took twenty two points in their battle with Alpine for fourth in the constructors.
The two rivals for last year’s championship made very similar errors at Memorial Corner, with Verstappen trying to overtake Norris and Hamilton Sainz on lap thirty-one and thirty-three respectively, they both went too early and got caught out on the damp and ran wide.
The seven-time world champion was fortunate to sustain manageable damage to his front wing and was even able to keep Verstappen behind him after re-joining the track in fifth. But Mercedes tried to use the opportunity to switch Hamilton to the slick tyre and change his front wing.
Verstappen rare mistake saw him lock up and wreck his tyres, before getting stuck behind Hamilton during the closing stages. The dismal result saw Ferrari strengthen their grip on second in the constructors’ championship, establishing a sixty-six point lead to halt Mercedes’ recent gains.
This was during a stop-start phase between lap eight and twenty-seven, caused by Guanyu Zhou and Alex Albon crashing into the barriers with the two Alpine’s of Fernando Alonso and Esteban Ocon retiring with power unit failures. The biggest benefactors from the dramas were Aston Martin, with Lance Stoll seventh and Sebastian Vettel ninth.
Alonso’s engine failure triggered a frantic few laps, he brought out the safety car on lap twenty-one, as the race resumed Alex Albon crashed into the wall on lap twenty-five causing a VSC. Two laps later, Ocon’s Alpine blew up in a cloud of smoke.
Verstappen despite his best efforts could only finish the race one place ahead of where he started seventh, although there were stages where he did run higher he was slotted in behind Lewis Hamilton following his stop. Then in the closing stages locked up as he tried to overtake Norris dropping him to eighth with thirty-seven minutes remaining.
The dutchman in the process flat-spotted his tyres and that forced him into a extra stop. Hamilton was well having a tough evening, when trying to fight Sainz for third he locked up going straight on into the wall at Memorial Corner, losing places to both Verstappen and Vettel.
While Leclerc cuts the lead to one hundred and four points, with five races to go he would need to win four and finish seventh in the other, and have Verstappen not score any more points to win the championship, an extremely unlikely prospect.
Stroll being sandwiched in the closing stages of the race passing firstly Hamilton, followed by Vettel and Verstappen. Pierre Gasly rounded out the top ten, finishing nearly twenty seconds ahead of Valtteri Bottas. Kevin Magnussen was twelfth the final car on the lead lap, ahead of Haas teammate Mick Schumacher.
George Russell finished outside the points for the first time this season, his race was marked by a puncher which dropped him down the order and a collision at Shears with Schumacher leaving him the final runner two laps down.
Related
- Singapore GP – Qualifying Result
- SINGAPORE GP – Charles Leclerc Takes Pole By Three-Hundredths With Red Bull Error Leaving Max Verstappen Ninth
- SINGAPORE GP – Carlos Sainz Leads A Ferrari One-Two In FP2 With Max Verstappen Third
- SINGAPORE GP – Lewis Hamilton tops FP1 eight hundredths ahead of Max Verstappen
- F1 Today – Singapore Prixview – 29/09/2022
- PRIXVIEW – Singapore Grand Prix
