Russell wins as tension overshadows title celebrations at McLaren

George Russell claimed victory under the Singapore floodlights, but McLaren’s simmering intra-team tension between Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri overshadowed what should have been a night of celebration for the newly crowned back-to-back constructors’ champions.

Having evaded the wet weather forecast all weekend, the Singapore skies finally opened in the hours leading up to the race start, with humidity and the night sky prolonging the drying process at the Marina Bay Street Circuit. 

As a result, and with the lap to the grid revealing Sectors 2 and 3 as particularly wet hazards, it was a toss-up between starting on the intermediate tyre or the slick tyre, with the latter ultimately winning out for the entire field.

Throwing caution to the wind as the five lights went out on the wet-dry grid, Lando Norris had a blistering start when he made up two places on Kimi Antonelli, and controversially, his teammate to steal P3.

Bullying his way past Oscar Piastri, the Brit shoved his teammate into the barriers at Turn 3, while also picking up damage to his front wing endplate when he tagged the rear of Max Verstappen’s Red Bull. 

The contact between teammates left Piastri fuming as he radioed to the McLaren in disapproval of Norris’ not “very team-like” overtake, before asking for clarification on whether or not the team was “cool with Lando barging me out of the way”.

The Australian’s indirect request to revert positions was denied by his race engineer, Tom Stallard, with the team following the stewards’ train off thought and taking no further action on the incident.

That didn’t satisfy Piastri, however, with the championship leader’s radio activated once again as he criticised Norris by saying: “If he had to avoid another car by crashing into his teammate, then that’s a pretty **** job of avoiding”.

Setting into fourth place, the Australian focused on controlling “the controllable” while the general drama also simmered down.

From Lap 1 onwards, however, the Singapore Grand Prix quietened down.

Following a brilliant launch off the line, which left Verstappen, who started on used soft compound tyres, in his mirrors, pole-sitter George Russell had a breezy first stint as he worked to calmly build a gap of almost ten seconds across the first 20 laps.

With the Dutchman off the pace and gradually falling back into Norris’ grasp due to his C5 tyre defect, Red Bull called its driver in for a pitstop on Lap 20, with Verstappen rejoining in P7 as the first front-runner on the hard compound tyre.

After attempting to fake Red Bull out in the laps that preceded Car No.1’s pitstop, Norris finally stuck to his word and relinquished his medium compound tyres on Lap 26, a decision that gifted Piastri the race lead for one lap before he too visited the pits.

After Norris was given the right to dictate the order of pitstops at McLaren, the team let Piastri down with a slow stop that resulted in the #81 rejoining the race almost ten seconds behind his teammate, however, it was the Australian who had marginally quicker pace across the second stint. 

Russell reclaimed his steady lead, with the Red Bull behind making slight gains before a costly lock-up left Verstappen using colourful language to describe his RB21.

As a result, the battle shifted to see the 2024 championship rivals spending the remaining 25 laps engaged in a fight for the silver medal, though their fellow drivers continued to play a role in how the race panned out, with the back-markers only contributing to Verstappen’s growing frustration.

Approaching a train of eight cars that spanned ten seconds, Verstappen’s task of guiding Norris through the blue flags proved to be a huge disadvantage on the timesheets, with the Brit able to claw his way within DRS range of the #1 by Lap 46.

The limited overtaking opportunities around the 4.9km street circuit leaned in Verstappen’s favour, with the McLaren driver unable to squeeze his way past the struggling Red Bull driver as the threat of his teammate grew in his mirrors. 

With 15 laps to go, Piastri started to work his way through the pack of lapped cars before discovering a competitive range of pace once he was back running in clear air.

The Australian closed the margin down to four seconds with ten laps on the board, before shaving another second off across the following two laps.

Gains continued to find the #81, with the margin to Norris’ bronze medal position dropping to as low as 1.9 seconds, however, as the chequered flag approached, it wasn’t enough to play a role in the podium fight.

Behind, late mayhem was unfolding at Ferrari when Lewis Hamilton lost his braking abilities in his mission to overtake Antonelli for P5. 

With sparks spraying from his front left brake, the seven-time world champion lost 45 seconds across the final two laps, an enticing factor for Charles Leclerc and Fernando Alonso, who was one of the only drivers to put on a show in Singapore.

The former teammates raced to the chequered flag, with Hamilton holding a four-tenth edge over the Aston Martin driver when they crossed the line, however, the Ferrari driver received a post-race five-second penalty for exceeding track limits, handing P7 to the Spaniard.

Hamilton’s most recent former teammate had no such concern when he took the chequered flag with 5.4 seconds of leeway to Verstappen, with Russell becoming the first Mercedes driver to win the Singapore Grand Prix since 2018. 

Russell’s fifth career victory also marks the 11th time the pole sitter had won across 16 Singapore GPs, etching his name in the minor history books while McLaren’s triumph took centre stage. 

After a messy weekend in Baku, and despite a controversial outing this evening, McLaren claimed its first back-to-back constructors’ world championship win since 1991, with pitlane celebrations roaring to life despite the heat draining all energy for the returning 20 drivers.

Thankfully, the field will have one weekend off to recover from the gruelling extremes the Singapore Grand Prix provides before jet-setting over to the Americas for the upcoming double header, starting in Austin, Texas, before venturing down to Mexico City.

The United States Grand Prix will be an early wake-up call for Australian fans, with the event running across October 18-20 (AEST).

Image: Andy Hone/LAT Images // Getty Images / Red Bull Content Pool.

Singapore Grand Prix Race Results:

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