Max Verstappen secured his first-ever victory at the Marina Bay Street Circuit by winning the Singapore Grand Prix Sprint, but the four-time World Champion immediately flagged a recurring problem with his starts that he warned could cost Red Bull in Sunday’s Grand Prix.
Verstappen, 29, started from pole position but lost the lead at the launch, allowing Mercedes’ George Russell to surge ahead. Russell’s race ended abruptly when he spun and crashed out of the final corner at the end of lap one, handing Verstappen the lead back. From that point, the Dutchman controlled the wet conditions on intermediate tyres and held off a charging Lewis Hamilton to take the win.
“The start was horrendous again, so that’s definitely something that we need to improve on, because if you have something like that tomorrow, that’s your race over if nothing crazy happens,” Verstappen said after the race, which had been delayed by heavy rain before it got underway.
Verstappen was candid about the role fortune played in the result. “We got a bit lucky with what happened with George out of the last corner,” he acknowledged. “After that, we just wanted to keep it calm and under control, because you know that you can’t pass around here, and especially in a condition like this with the intermediates.”
Singapore had been the only circuit on the current calendar where Verstappen had not previously won, but the Red Bull driver was quick to downplay the milestone. “I don’t see this as a win in terms of actually winning a Grand Prix,” he said. “I want to win tomorrow. We need to have a good Qualifying. It will be very close with a lot of cars I think, and we just need to try to make sure that we are the best one out of them.”
It was a far grimmer afternoon for Verstappen’s Red Bull teammate Isack Hadjar, who retired from the Sprint in the opening laps due to a mechanical failure. “I didn’t really have power at the start,” the Frenchman said. “Then it sounded very bad and I had to retire the car, so very straightforward.”
With the street circuit’s notoriously narrow layout making overtaking difficult, Verstappen’s ability to manage the gap to Hamilton through the tricky conditions proved decisive. The focus for Red Bull now turns to qualifying and eliminating the launch issues before the Grand Prix.