Singapore GP: strategist Sainz gives Ferrari first win of 2023

What a race in Singapore! On the day in which the dominators of 2023 step aside, the outcome of the Grand Prix was uncertain until the last lap: Carlos Sainz comes out on top, after 62 laps of tactical masterpiece.

Let's see the final classification of the race:

Only the clever Mercedes strategy put Sainz' race win at risk

As often happens in Singapore, the race is played at a strategic level... As seen in 2019 with Leclerc or the previous year with Hamilton, for example, it's common practice for those leading the race not to set blistering laptimes, trying instead to keep the pack as close as possible.

Glenn Dunbar / Motorsport Images

By doing so, any attempt at an undercut by those following is nipped in the bud, given that making a pit stop in conditions of a close field means ending up in the traffic of slower cars... Knowing this, Sainz and the Ferrari pitwall opted for a rather slow first stint, to the point that - taking on the radio - Carlos told his race engineer Riccardo Adami: "I could get to the end of the race at this pace!"

The opportunity to make the first pit stop without any risk of losing the lead to Norris and Russell, who were behind the Ferrari pair at the time, was favoured by Logan Sargeant's Williams collision with the barriers. The amount of debris left on the track by the American driver forced the race direction to bring the Safety Car on track, so the following drivers came into the pits:

  • Sainz (entered P1, came out in P1);
  • Russell (entered P3, came out in P3);
  • Norris (entered P4, came out in P5);
  • Leclerc (entered P2, came out in P6);
  • Hamilton (entered P5, came out in P7);

In second and fourth position, among the above-mentioned opponents, were the two Red Bulls of Verstappen and Perez. The strategy of the English-Austrian pitwall was simple, as after the start on Hard tyres, they hoped to cover a very long first stint and then gain some positions in the final part of the race, where they would fit - as they then did - the better performing Medium tyres.

Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

At the restart from the Safety Car regime, Russell and Norris had an easy time overtaking Verstappen and rejoining the leader Sainz, while the situation became quite complicated for Leclerc, who - in addition to having lost the two positions mentioned - was also passed by Hamilton in an attempt to overtake Perez... Charles' race, sacrificed from the Ferrari pitwall to protect his teammate's race win, was hit by continuous increases in engine temperature as soon as the Monegasque got too close to any opponent.

"Today it's normal that I was sacrificed, we had already discussed it before the race. In the first stint the situation was a little different, because we had a better pace than the Mercedes, so it was positive. That's why I asked if it was possible change the strategy; but then we did very well, because Carlos managed to win and that's what counts. For my part, I would have liked to have had a better result, because the pace was there. However, when Russell and Hamilton passed me, I understood that that would be the end of my race [...] The performance today was very positive, because on a high-downforce track it's nice to show this type of performance, especially after the difficulties in Zandvoort!"

Charles Leclerc

Carlos Sainz's tactic of keeping the pack close lasted until lap 44, when the sudden technical problem that occurred on Esteban Ocon's Alpine (which stopped on the side of the track near Turn 1) resulted in a Virtual Safety Car. In this circumstance, the Mercedes pitwall decided - correctly in my opinion - to give up the track position and call both its drivers back into the pits, fit new sets of Medium tyres on their W14s and try to recover the gap of around 15 seconds they had lost against Sainz in the meantime.

Andy Hone / Motorsport Images

The pace set by Russell and even more so by Hamilton was immediately extremely faster than the leaders, and from a quick calculation it was clear that there would be plenty of time to regain first position - even net of the overtaking to be done. Once he overtook Leclerc, this impression became even more evident as Norris would have remained the only defensive line for the Spanish Ferrari driver. But here's the fun part...

Jake Grant / Motorsport Images

Alerted of the comeback of Russell and Hamilton, Sainz purposely decided to let Norris (who was about 1.6 s behind) come closer to allow him to use the DRS and defend himself from the attacks of the two Mercedes. The strategy worked perfectly for the last 4 laps, and - precisely during the 62nd and final lap of the race - Russell exaggerated in Turn 10 and hit the wall, losing a podium that even seemed too little for his Sunday.

"It's an incredible feeling, an incredible weekend... I want to thank every member of Ferrari for making an incredible effort to turn this season around. I'm sure that all of Italy and all the Ferrari fans are happy [...] Today we tried to hide our limitations on tyre deg, but then the Safety Car arrived earlier than expected, so I had to do a much longer stint on the Hards while trying to keep George behind. In the final laps I tried to give DRS to Lando to help him, and so we managed to finish in P1"

Carlos Sainz

"I'm at a loss for words, because we came very close to our goal... I joined Lando, and if I had managed to overtake him I would have had the opportunity to win. It was a very long race and very tough physically, but I paid dearly I made a mistake for a couple of centimeters while I was pushing to the limit. Honestly, I have nothing else to say"

George Russell

Hamilton benefited from this, having showed (as mentioned) a better race pace in the last stint... He will probably regret what happened at the start, where following an off track he had voluntarily decided to give up his position to Russell and Norris, in attempt to avoid a penalty which - it turned out later - would never have inflicted!

"First of all I want to congratulate Carlos and Lando, who did a great job. We had set up the weekend differently, to have a different strategy in the race. In my opinion, the race was a two-stop one, but it must be said that the others did a fantastic job today [...] The mistake in the first corners was a shame, but I kept my head down and kept pushing. Big bad luck for George too: we were pushing so hard to catch up those in front of us that we overheated the tyres, and he made a mistake. Today we just have to be happy with what we did"

Lewis Hamilton

The anonymous race of the two Red Bulls, a missed opportunity for Alpine and disaster at Aston Martin

Strange as it may seem, today we have to talk about Red Bull not as the dominators of the weekend (as happened in the 14 events before Singapore), but among the teams that struggled the most... The strategy of starting on Hards, in hindsight, proved to be a failure: too many pieces would have had to fall into place for Verstappen and Perez to be able to get back to the leading group, so I believe that a first stint on the Softs would have been a better strategic trade-off, especially as they had to recover from starting positions in the midfield.

Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

Any strategic consideration, however, clashes with a simple truth: the performances shown throughout the weekend in Singapore by Red Bull weren't enough to worry Ferrari, McLaren and Mercedes. Long story short, for once the Milton Keynes team found itself in the situation that its rivals usually have to face!

"Everything went against us even in the race with the Safety Cars, so it was perhaps the worst case scenario [...] Clearly we learned a lot from today and perhaps also from what we did wrong yesterday: I can't go into detail, but we'll only be able to prove it next year, if we return here [...] I think we will be fast once again in Suzuka..."

Max Verstappen

At Alpine, the 8 points gained thanks to Gasly's sixth place are a miserable haul, if you consider that Ocon could have finished in P5. But, as mentioned, a technical problem put an end to his race 20 laps from the chequered flag, so the Frenchman heads to Suzuka with a "zero" in the drivers' standings.

Andy Hone / Motorsport Images

Worse fate befell Aston Martin, which after Stroll's withdrawal due to the huge accident in qualifying found itself starting the race only with Alonso. Fernando himself ran into the worst race of his year, where everything happened to him: a 5-second penalty for having crossed the pit lane entry line, a rather slow pit stop due to an error by his mechanics, a mistake in Turn 14 and - after 62 forgettable laps - the 15th and last position at the finish line.

Steven Tee / Motorsport Images

"It was an extremely difficult evening, everything that could go wrong went wrong for us. We came here with high hopes, but Singapore is a unique event... We will have to analyze the data because the car was very difficult to drive, it had very little rear end and this has led to abnormal tyre wear. Obviously we don't have the answers yet, but we hope to be able to get rid of all these negative things, to learn from them and to improve in Japan"

Fernando Alonso

Other food for thought in the midfield...

Also worth mentioning is the excellent performance of the other McLaren, with Piastri who climbed from his 17th starting position to a well-deserved P7, and the first career points for Liam Lawson, who - in the underperforming Alpha Tauri AT04 - finished in P9 right behind Sergio Perez.

"Today we should have been in P8, we were running in a good position and we had an excellent strategy. We expected the Safety Car to come in and in fact we had kept the new set of Medium tyres for that situation [...] We spent a really positive race, moving up the pack, arriving in ninth position and getting closer to Lawson. We probably would have needed a couple more laps to overtake him, but then I had a contact with Perez after he made a maneuver that in my opinion was very optimistic. This put me out of the points"

Alexander Albon

Perez himself had a very "dirty" comeback in his race, but which nevertheless highlighted once again the huge difference in terms of performance between him and his teammate Verstappen. Among the opponents whose race was ruined by Perez we find Tsunoda (who in fact retired in the first few laps) and Alex Albon, who a few laps before the chequered flag had to lose the P8 he was in due to a reckless attack from the Mexican in Turn 13. The 5 second penalty imposed on the latter was however irrelevant for the purposes of the final classification, which saw the Red Bull driver retaining eighth position over Lawson and Magnussen's Haas.

For everyone there's immediately the exam in Suzuka to confirm or overturn the results of Singapore

The Marina Bay weekend therefore ends with the first non-Red Bull victory of 2023, a unique event in this season dominated by the Milton Keynes team. Already this weekend the paddock is moving towards the legendary Suzuka, to compete in the Japanese Grand Prix which last year crowned Max Verstappen as World Champion for the second time.

But the one smiling today, after so many disappointments and many mistakes, is Ferrari: perhaps it won't be a turning point in this Championship, but it is still a valid reason to raise a flag in Maranello...

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