Leclerc on pole position in Singapore, Verstappen in 8th place

Charles Leclerc will have the upper hand in Sunday’s Singapore GP race. The Monegasque was fastest in qualifying with a time of 1:49.412, followed by Perez and Hamilton.

Verstappen, who did not complete his last lap, will start from 8th place. In fact, he was told to enter the seats, which infuriated the Dutchman.

Charles Leclerc clinched his ninth pole position of the year for round 17 of Formula 1 in Singapore in an unusual qualifying session that started on wet tarmac – necessitating intermediate rain tires in the first two sessions.

In Q3, however, almost everyone lined up with slicks – soft dry rubber – and those who didn’t soon returned to the pits to fit them. But with the wet conditions and low temperatures at night, heating up the slicks proved difficult as drivers stayed behind for consecutive laps and times steadily dropped as the tarmac dried.

With fresh, soft rubber (except for Carlos Sainz, who defied Ferrari’s pit stop order), after consecutive fastest personal laps of all that changed the standings – also putting Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso on top – finished Charles Leclerc in the lead – only Max Verstappen remained to complete his last two fast laps.

On the first of those laps, the Dutchman was just close to Leclerc’s time, but when the order came over the radio to return to the pits and abort both that lap and the next, the champion reacted angrily and yelled at his mechanic – who tried to calm him down Him.

According to initial reports, Verstappen was given the RBR order because the team realized he didn’t have enough fuel to complete his next fast lap and then another to return to the pits. And if he ran out of fuel on the track, he had to start from last place. So RBR decided to play it safe and risk-free.

After all, he had nothing to lose: the scenario of Verstappen winning the title in Singapore this year, in which the Dutchman should have won and Leclerc should have finished 8th, was far-fetched anyway.

Nobody knows if Max would have taken pole position away from Leclerc on his final lap – who was ultimately relieved by the choice of slick tires in Q3: “These qualifications hid many pitfalls. In Q3 we didn’t know what to do, we opted for the slick soft tires at the last minute.

I made a mistake on my last lap and didn’t think we would get pole, but it was enough. Given the Friday we had, we reacted well. We don’t have enough data for the race but I’m sure we can win.” said the Monegasque.

With no fuel issues at the end, Sergio Perez in the other RB18 finished second ahead of Lewis Hamilton in the Brit’s most competitive performance of the year at a track suitable for the Mercedes W13. Lewis ended up looking like a threat for pole position but lost time on the slow corners of Marina Bay’s third section.

He was joined on the second row by Saint, who may be wondering what would have happened if he had run on fresh, soft tyres, while on the third row will be the all-weather Fernando Alonso with Alpine and Lando Norris with McLaren.

Verstappen will start eighth with his early retirement – despite being far from pole in three of his five wins in as many recent GPs.

The big surprise of Q2 was the disqualification of George Russell, who lost his brakes on his first attempt and was 6 milliseconds behind Haas’ Kevin Magnussen. Finally, in Q1, Esteban Ocon retired with problems with the brakes on his Alpine A522