Verstappen is scary again with the pole sprint and Aston Martin does not meet expectations

Max Verstappen. He again. And this time, it is confirmed. The Dutchman already warned of the great leap forward of his Red Bull with his race pace in Bakuwhere he rose from 8th to 2nd place, and with his pole and victory in Malaysia. How destroyed the Sepang asphalt was meant that there was still some more proof that Max already had the car to constantly fight for victories between now and the end of the season. And it was clear with the turnaround that the four-time world champion pulled off, which helped him achieve the pole sprint in the 2026 F1 Singapore GP (preview)

The pilot of Red Bull He was the last to go out on the track, with brutal cold blood, with all his rivals already on the asphalt to go for the best time. And his thing was to arrive and kiss the saint. It didn’t need warming up. He went out and nailed it.

He won first in a nice time trial face-to-face against Charles Leclerc that seemed destined for success. The Monegasque had already set a great time and was improving on his second attempt. But Max swept it. Verstappen and the Monegasque were very evenly matched before the last sector. It seemed that things were going to be defined by small details. But then, the plane arrived. Verstappen flew in the third sector to surpass by 0″243 Charleswho also had to see how George Russell surpassed him ‘in extremis’ to snatch second place.

In this way, Verstappen will start from pole in this Saturday’s sprint race at the Singapore GPon the Marina Bay street circuit, ahead of Russell and Leclerc (2nd and 3rd), with Piastri in fourth position after being 55 thousandths behind Leclerc and 0″298 of Verstappen’s time.

Oscar was able to surpass his partner this time Norris, 5th at 0.431, with a time 0.133 worse than the Australian. And Hamilton could only be 6th despite being totally on fire in his final lap.

The seven-time king was seen as too aggressive, risking a lot, skidding after breaking the record in the first sector, and even suffering a whiplash near the wall. Hamilton seemed in one of those spectacular pole laps, but he lost everything in the end, already without tires due to his attacking driving, staying half a second behind Max’s best time.far.

Verstappen seems to have the car to go for everything in the last seven rounds. He arrived late. He is 132 points behind leader Kimi, 7th in this session. Even if he won everything, a comeback seems impossible. It is more likely that he can go for the runner-up position that Russell and Hamilton are fighting for. Max is 48 points behind a Russell who will leave behind on Sunday due to an engine change and also 26 behind Lewis. He has them there. The ‘coconut’ is coming.

The leader sank

But without a doubt, the great negative surprise of the day was seeing the World Cup leader, Kimi Antonelli, in 7th position, six tenths off the best already more than half a second behind his teammate Russell. And that opens up an even bigger issue: The improvements introduced by Mercedes at Sepang seem to have actually made the car worse.

The Italian was stuck on a route as complex as Singapore, between walls, from Free Practice 1, driving with the new features that no longer worked in Malaysia. They thought it was something temporary due to the state of the Sepang asphalt, but the start in Singapore with this new package has not gone much better. Kimi finished very far from where he should have and admitted that he still has to understand how to drive with these new parts: “The car is very difficult, very unpredictable and it is very difficult to put together a good lap. It’s a shame because I came with a lot of hopes but so far it has been very difficult.”

It could have taken its toll on him in this context to only have one training session before the fight against the clock. In that FP1, his teammate George drove with the aerodynamic package before Sepang to compare it with some evolutions that did not work in Malaysia. And Russell repeated in the ‘qualy’ sprint with the old car. And it was second. That says a lot of things.

This time, Kimiwith a margin of 84 points in the F1 World Championship, will have a difficult time coming back in the sprint due to the complexity of overtaking on the streets of Singapore. You could lose points regarding george, Charles and Verstappenbut you shouldn’t worry because in the sprint, the biggest prize is the 8 points that the winner takes. He will have to worry more about improving for the main classification on Saturday if he does not want to suffer on Sunday.

Alonso, 15th

More was expected from Aston Martin at the Singapore GP, on a circuit that both the driver and the team pointed out could be the best for them on the entire calendar due to the lack of long straights. But the start of the Grand Prix was not as expected. One could think that the green car, with Fernando at the wheel, could aspire to get close to SQ3 or get into that area. But it wasn’t like that.

The man from Oviedo finished half a second from the cut-off time to get into the top 10 (Gasly was 10th), and 0.485 from 11th, Colapintoalso surpassed by the Audi and the haas of bearman.

Racing Bullsexcept for a Lindblad out of position (fell in SQ1), along with the Alpinethey started dominating the middle zone and are favorites for Q3 this Saturday, and Audi and Bearman’s Haas They were initially superior to an Aston Martin that will have to change something if it wants to improve in the main classification.

Sainz will start last due to a “human error” by the FIA

Carlos Sainz will start last in the GP sprint race Singaporewithout options after a SQ1 in which he could not do anything to make the cut with a car that does not perform on this track and in which he had brake problems that he could not solve despite changing them after Free Practice 1.

He had no options, but in addition, he was affected by a human error that the FIA ​​admitted, which left him and other cars without ‘Overtaking Mode’, which gives extra power, during the middle of his last lap in SQ1.

Something very strange happened in the time table. The Spanish driver was somewhat higher among those eliminated in the first part of the short classification, but suddenly, he moved to the last place (22nd) without explanation.

The FIA ​​later published a statement warning of a human error: “During the first period of the sprint classification, a human error occurred in Race Direction, independent of the timing problem that was also experienced in SQ1. This error caused Overtaking Mode to be unavailable after the red flag period during SQ1,” the text argues.

“When it was detected that Overtaking Mode was not activated after the restart, it was activated for a period of 27 seconds before being deactivated again. The FIA ​​recognizes that this unfortunate human error affected the performance of certain cars, depending on the timing of their lap and their position on the circuit. The second and third parts of the sprint classification were not affected,” he added.

Carlos was one of those affected. In fact, at that moment, the team alerted him that after this problem that had affected some drivers, the FIA ​​could decide to give more minutes to that session. But in the end, nothing happened and Sainz will start 22nd.