Max Verstappen lifts Singapore curse with crushing F1 victory

Max Verstappen finally won the Singapore Grand Prix at the 10th attempt with a crushing performance at Marina Bay.

From pole position, Verstappen put in a dominant lights-to-flag victory to record his second successive victory and record his first in the Singapore GP, leaving the new Spanish GP at Madrid as the only circuit on the 2026 calendar he has not won a race at. 

Verstappen saw off a strong challenge from Ferrari's Charles Leclerc off the line to lead out of Turn 3 and was relatively untroubled thereafter as he scored a 73rd grand prix victory ahead of Leclerc and Kimi Antonelli. 

Antonelli finished third, with George Russell in ninth, meaning the gap between the two Mercedes drivers is 102 points. Antonelli now has his first championship point, coming in the United States GP next time out. 

Lewis Hamilton suffered a messy strategy race for Ferrari, and finished sixth on a one-stopper as his tyres fell off the cliff in the closing stages. 

Verstappen's Singapore dominance

On the grid, a difference in strategy emerged as Verstappen and Leclerc took soft tyres for the start, with Hamilton opting for the mediums to try and create a difference with Verstappen. 

At the start, Leclerc tried to slither up the inside of Verstappen, but the Red Bull held firm to keep the lead as Leclerc led Hamilton, Antonelli and the two McLaren drivers of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri.

Quickly, this leading sextet of cars dropped the Racing Bulls of Liam Lawson as Hamilton acted as the cap in the bottle as Verstappen and Leclerc slowly edged away. 

Although Leclerc was able to harry Verstappen in the opening laps, by Lap 9, Verstappen had got out of overtake mode activation and pulled away from the Ferrari thereafter, as attention then turned to Hamilton's pace on the mediums. 

With the softs proving the best race tyre, Hamilton abandoned his medium strategy on Lap 18 for the switch to softs, and immediately began to set purple laps, and told he was on "Plan C" - a two-stop strategy. 

By Lap 24, Leclerc pitted and emerged just ahead of Hamilton for the change to mediums, with this stunting Hamilton's progress.

Verstappen pitted for his change on Lap 32 followed by Norris as it started to become clear that Hamilton's strategy was going to leave him exposed - despite his attempts to ask the team to "tough it out."

At a virtual safety car on Lap 39 for Lance Stroll's stopped Aston Martin, Leclerc and Antonelli both pitted, but Ferrari did not double-stack Hamilton behind the Monegasque, further leaving  Hamilton hung out as Leclerc quickly passed him. 

Hamilton then fell into the clutches of Norris and Antonelli in the closing laps as he tried to hang on, but as he held Norris up on Lap 54, both drivers went wide at Turn 1, as Antonelli sliced past both in quick succession.

The duelling Hamilton and Norris then allowed Antonelli to escape up the road and wipe out the effects of a potential five-second penalty for track limits - but the move and failure for Russell to get higher than ninth means Antonelli can win the title in the United States. 

The gap is now 102 points, with 125 points left after the next race in Austin - meaning if Antonelli wins and Russell does not finish higher than 10th, the Italian will be crowned.

Piastri stole fifth from the struggling Hamilton after a pit-stop just after the VSC for a slow front-right puncture with Lawson hanging onto seventh ahead of Nico Hulkenberg and Russell - who just missed out on being able to pit under the Stroll VSC - and then pitted just as it ended.

Isack Hadjar nabbed the final point from the pit-lane after a late pass on Pierre Gasly.

The non-scorers

The first non-points scorer was Gasly for Alpine, ahead of Oliver Bearman, who enjoyed a clean early battle with team-mate Esteban Ocon, who was 13th. 

Carlos Sainz, Arvid Lindblad, Fernando Alonso, Alex Albon, Sergio Perez, and Valtteri Bottas were the other finishers.

There were three drivers who failed to finish the grand prix.

Stroll stopped with a clutch failure, Franco Colapinto of Alpine with a driveline issue, whilst Gabriel Bortoleto suffered an early gearbox failure for Audi.