Max Verstappen earned sprint pole position, underscoring Red Bull’s upward momentum following his victory in Malaysia, yet he now faces a potential investigation over a manoeuvre performed under yellow flags before the session was halted for a Pérez incident.
The four‑time world champion admitted he had not expected to claim pole before qualifying.
He said, “We are still dealing with some ride‑height issues, as we know, but using the soft tyres in the final session helped make the car more stable in sectors where it was previously unpredictable. I didn’t anticipate this result, but I’m happy to take it. Qualifying tomorrow remains our primary goal, and the start is always critical for us. At least we ended the day on a positive note.”
George Russell’s performance relative to his teammate Franco Antonelli intensifies doubts about the effectiveness of Mercedes’ upgrade introduced at the Malaysian Grand Prix.
It was their most significant aerodynamic package since the Canadian Grand Prix in June, yet team principal Toto Wolff remarked after Sepang that the changes seemed to have moved them backwards rather than forward.
Mercedes introduced a split specification at Singapore in a bid to gain deeper insight into the car’s behaviour, but Antonelli finished the session 0.573 seconds behind teammate Russell.
Russell commented, “As a team, there’s still nothing that tells us the upgrade isn’t working, but it’s all about the stopwatch, and the stopwatch hasn’t been kind to us yet. Maybe tomorrow will be different.”
Antonelli, who leads the championship by 84 points heading into the weekend, lamented, “From FP1 I was already struggling, and there’s still a lot to understand about this package. The car is incredibly difficult, unpredictable, and hard to set up. It’s a shame—I entered with high hopes, but so far it has been very tough.”
“It’s going to be a tough weekend unless we can extract something tomorrow. Apart from that, it’s very tricky; I honestly don’t see where we can gain 0.7 seconds, but you never know.”
Team principal Toto Wolff remarked before sprint qualifying, “The new car appears a bit more challenging to drive—not necessarily slower, as there will be advantages somewhere—but perhaps we haven’t yet found a way to combine all its elements and tune it optimally. The older specification feels a bit more stable and grippier, but that’s just a single data point.”
Charles Leclerc sat 0.243 seconds off pole and lamented that Ferrari were “losing a little bit of our raw performance” over the past three or four races.
He added, however, “I still feel there is potential in the car, and maybe tomorrow we can be in the mix for pole.”
Lewis Hamilton explained, “We followed a slightly different lap plan compared to the others—it was my decision, but I think we got that wrong. Ultimately, the car was very oversteery on that lap. Whether the rear tyres were not ready or overheating is hard to say, but it felt snappy and oversteery overall.”
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