@SChecoPerez with-stands pressure from @CharlesLeclerc to clinch #SingaporeGP victory. #F1

Perez Singapore GP victory – Red Bull’s Sergio Perez withstood pressure from Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc to claim victory in a thrilling Singapore GP with the Mexican escaping losing his win following a post-race investigation from the stewards for a safety car infringement.

 

 

The Grand Prix was delayed by an hour and five minutes due to an intense thunderstorm cell, which hit the Marina Bay Street Circuit in the build-up to the 8pm local start time, but the result was not confirmed at the chequered flag as Perez was under investigation for a safety car infringement.

 

The verdict came in that Perez was given a five-second time penalty + two penalty points on his licence and one reprimand for his safety car infringements and therefore keeps his Singapore GP victory.

 

The safety car was deployed twice, with three virtual safety cars also taking place in the action-packed race.

 

When the 61-lap Singapore GP began, pole-sitter Leclerc and Perez both made similar reactions from the front row, but the latter accelerated better as they launched off the line and swept by the Ferrari to comfortably take the lead into the first corner.

 

Behind, the other Ferrari F1-75 entry of Carlos Sainz and Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton ran alongside each other into turn one and made slight contact into the apex of turn two, which sent the seven-time world champion wide and down to fourth, the incident reviewed by the stewards was deemed not worthy to be investigated further.

 

The same thing happened for reigning world champion Max Verstappen, who cut the opening corner after he had a dismal start off the line after almost going into anti-stall and dropped from eighth to 12^th.

 

At the front, Perez pulled away from Leclerc – but only to around a second over the opening proceedings, with Sainz and Hamilton – complaining about his intermediate rubber to his Mercedes early – soon behind by over five seconds.

 

Perez posted a string of fastest laps but could only manage a 1.4 second gap before Leclerc began to reel the Red Bull back in, reaching 0.8 seconds behind the Mexican at the end of the eighth tour.

 

But then the race was stabilised by the first deployment of the safety car, extending the 100% record of safety car appearances in Singapore.

 

It was brought out to cover Alfa Romeo’s Zhou Guanyu being recovered from the escape road of turn five, where the Chinese driver had parked it after Williams Racing’s Nicholas Latifi had drifted across the C42’s path and sent him into the wall.

 

This broke Zhou’s front-right wheel and eliminated him from the race, whilst Latifi slowly returned to the pits with a puncture, where the Canadian too retired.

 

The race went green on the 11^th tour with none of the leaders having opted to pit – the circuit as it did between FP3 and qualifying took a long time to dry, as Perez and Leclerc ran in the two-minute bracket.

 

Perez got a great restart and immediately re-established his one-second lead to Leclerc, who also again rapidly dropped team-mate Sainz and Hamilton – the pre-safety car scenes recreated as both front-runners were the only drivers running in the 1:59’s.

 

They switched fastest laps between each other before Perez pulled away from the Ferrari, with his lead reaching 1.7 seconds by the 15^th tour and quarter race distance, where the leaders began to be warned by their respective teams to cool their intermediate tyres on the remaining wet spots on the track, with the circuit still not ready for slicker rubber.

 

The leaders got into the 1:58’s bracket just before the 20^th tour, at this point Perez’s gap went over two seconds for the first time.

 

Leclerc had just started sliding rapidly further back, when the race was stabilised again due to a virtual safety car on lap 21 when Alpine’s Fernando Alonso pulled off at turn ten, his 350^th Grand Prix ending with an engine problem.

 

The front-runners again not pitted for a fresh set of inters, but back in 15^th Mercedes’ George Russell took a risk by putting on a fresh set of C4 yellow side-walled medium compounds.

 

The virtual safety car lasted two laps, with Perez’s gap over Leclerc continuing at 2.5 seconds, but just after a further three tours the first of two further VSC deployments kicked in when Williams Racing’s Alexander Albon – an opening lap spinner at the rear – slid into the turn eight barriers and broke off the front wing of his FW44 racer.

 

The Thai-Briton driver reversed away and drove back to the pits to retire the other FW44, as the virtual safety car ended on the 27^th lap but being deployed again a tour later because Esteban Ocon’s Alpine A522 racer had also retired with an engine problem – the Frenchman’s power-train blowing up over the Anderson Bridge and approaching the 13^th corner.

 

The race went green again on lap 30, with Perez’s lead up to 4.3 seconds before Leclerc went into the 1:56’s and he cut the gap down to under three seconds within two laps.

 

Here a series of dramatic events took place, with Hamilton, who was frustrated stuck behind Sainz’s F1-75 racer and slid into the barriers as he chased the Spaniard on the 33^rd tour.

 

Hamilton reversed and rejoined just in-front of 2021 championship-rival Verstappen, who in-turn had been chasing McLaren’s Lando Norris.

 

On the opening tour, Verstappen looked to have made fast progress back past Haas F1 Team’s Kevin Magnussen but found it difficult against the Dane.

 

Verstappen dived past the VF-22 at turn seven, but on the exit appeared to squeeze Magnussen towards the wall, the duo making contact and Magnussen’s front-left wing end-plate getting damaged.

 

Magnussen then forced his way passed Verstappen at the tight turn 11 just before the Anderson Bridge, but the Dutchman got his way by on the following tour.

 

The turn seven incident was investigated by the stewards, but no penalty was applied despite Magnussen being forced to pit to have his front-wing changed by the race officials just before the safety car was deployed.

 

Verstappen by that point, had also overtaken AlphaTauri’s Yuki Tsunoda before getting stuck behind Aston Martin’s Sebastian Vettel and running 20 seconds adrift of his Red Bull team-mate Perez’s race lead.

 

The gap was erased and stabilised, after which Verstappen passed Vettel and AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly to run in seventh.

 

But again the Verstappen got stuck, this time behind Alonso and remained there until the Alpine retired in-front.

 

Verstappen was soon right behind the rear of Norris’s McLaren but did not look likely to make a quick overtake before Albon and Ocon VSC deployments – at the end of the second corner nearly passing Norris when trying to get an early restart jump and dropping back.

 

It was into the gap that Hamilton slotted, but his front-left end-plate got damaged, which Verstappen reported over the radio in the hope the Mercedes would be given a black-and-white flag.

 

Just passed the halfway point of proceedings, Russell was setting purple sectors on his slicker tyres, but way off the back of the pack.

 

This brought in a wave of cars to pit, with Tsunoda the first to stop and put on a set of mediums.

 

But the Japanese driver pushed too hard on his second full-flyer on the mediums and smashed into the turn ten barriers, bringing out another safety car.

 

Perez and Leclerc had already been in the pits to stop – the latter doing so first on the 34^th tour – before the Grand Prix was stabilised again on the 36^th lap so Tsunoda’s AT03 racer could be removed.

 

Sainz, Hamilton and Magnussen done likewise, with the Silver Arrow getting a new nose fitted, whilst Norris stayed out.

 

The Briton came in under the safety car, which preserved his gap over Verstappen, and they were the main focus of attention on the 40^th tour restart as Perez and Leclerc, weaving to get temperature into their medium tyres, easily rebuilt their advantage over Sainz.

 

On the restart lap, Verstappen moved rapidly to overtake Norris after the turn six kink down the circuit’s first long acceleration zone following the corner where Zhou and Latifi tangled earlier before.

 

But his RB18 racer appeared to bottom out as he went off-track and the Red Bull driver locked both his front-wheels, severely flat-spotting his mediums.

 

The reigning world champion pitted at the end of the tour and dropped to 13^th, with the action up-front intensifying as Leclerc fired his tyres up to optimal temperature better than Perez.

 

He put the Mexican under intense pressure for almost ten laps, with it now clear the Grand Prix will end at the two-hour time limit and not go the scheduled distance.

 

Perez reported driveability issues under braking and whilst accelerating out of the corners, which compromised his efforts to break-free from Leclerc’s lost attention.

 

This became more of a challenge when DRS was finally enabled on the 43^rd tour and here Leclerc’s push began.

 

Time-and-time again the Monegasque driver moved to Perez’s inside at every major stop around the Marina Bay Street Circuit – suffering a lock-up briefly at turn 15 on the 45^th lap.

 

The next two times at that point, Perez suffered massive lock-ups too, but was managing the pressure from the Ferrari well.

 

Leclerc cut the gap down to 0.4 seconds at the end of the 47^th tour but having to catch a massive snap of over-steer and slide at turn 16 meant the Ferrari driver lost crucial momentum and fell out of DRS range.

 

He never regained it after, a 52^nd lap near-off finally ended his pursuit as Perez’s gap reached 2.6 seconds.

 

There was still work to do for Perez as he was placed under investigation by the stewards following the second safety car restart, for allegedly dropping more than ten car lengths back allowed to the safety car too early, something Hamilton also reported that Perez also did at the initial safety car restart.

 

Perez therefore went onto clinch the Singapore GP victory by 7.595 seconds over Leclerc with the final race distance of 59 tours, with Ferrari telling Leclerc after he crossed the line in second place that Perez could be hit with two five-second penalties added to his time if found to be guilty by the investigation.

 

Sainz came a distant third never having the same pace as his Ferrari team-mate at any point of the race, with Norris also in a quiet fourth and in-front of McLaren team-mate Daniel Ricciardo, who had also pitted under the safety car and gained an advantage to his Aston Martin rivals.

 

Lance Stroll was the leader of the AMR22 racers – ahead of Verstappen who put in another charge now on the softs, getting back into the points-paying positions over the closing stages.

 

It looked as if Verstappen would finish ninth as he was bottled up again, this time behind Hamilton’s F1 W13 before the seven-time world champion made another error.

 

Whilst in-between Verstappen and Vettel up ahead, Hamilton attempted to pass Vettel’s Aston Martin on the 57^th lap, but the Briton ran deep having taken to a still-wet part of the circuit approaching the eighth corner.

 

This allowed Verstappen through, and he passed Vettel on the final tour, with Hamilton ending the race in ninth in-front of Gasly’s AlphaTauri.

 

Russell brought up the rear behind Alfa Romeo’s Valtteri Bottas (finished in 11^th), who he had slightly hit with in an overtaking lunge during the earlier proceedings.

 

Magnussen finished 12^th and in-front of team-mate Mick Schumacher, who Russell also tangled with – this time at the opening corner just after the second safety car restart in an incident, which was investigated but was not worthy of punishment.

 

Russell pitted four times, with a late final stop for a second set of softer compounds that he used to post the race’s fastest lap with a 1:46.458, which he did not get the bonus fastest lap point for as he finished in 14^th place.

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2022 Singapore GP – The Top Three

 

 

2022 Singapore GP Winner – Sergio Perez, #11, Oracle Red Bull Racing-RBPT, RB18:

“Certainly my best performance. I controlled the race; the last few laps were so intense. I gave it everything for the win today. I have no idea what’s going on [with the investigation] I was just told to increase the gap. All in all a fantastic day.”

 

2^nd Place – Charles Leclerc, #16, Scuderia Ferrari, F1-75:

“I pushed all the way, the bad start put us on the back foot. I had a little bit of wheelspin. Difficult [race], a good night’s sleep and we’ll get ready for Japan.”

 

3^rd Place – Carlos Sainz, #55, Scuderia Ferrari, F1-75:

“Very tough out there, never got into the rhythm in the wet. I had to settle a bit for P3, I was quick towards the end when I managed to build a bit of confidence. It’s crazy how long it takes here to dry.”

 

Formula 1 Singapore Airlines Singapore Grand Prix 2022 Race Results Classification (61 Laps)

POS	NO	DRIVER	CAR	LAPS	TIME/RETIRED	PTS
1	11	Sergio Perez	RED BULL RACING RBPT	59	2:02:15.238	25
2	16	Charles Leclerc	FERRARI	59	+2.595s	18
3	55	Carlos Sainz	FERRARI	59	+10.305s	15
4	4	Lando Norris	MCLAREN MERCEDES	59	+21.133s	12
5	3	Daniel Ricciardo	MCLAREN MERCEDES	59	+53.282s	10
6	18	Lance Stroll	ASTON MARTIN ARAMCO MERCEDES	59	+56.330s	8
7	1	Max Verstappen	RED BULL RACING RBPT	59	+58.825s	6
8	5	Sebastian Vettel	ASTON MARTIN ARAMCO MERCEDES	59	+60.032s	4
9	44	Lewis Hamilton	MERCEDES	59	+61.515s	2
10	10	Pierre Gasly	ALPHATAURI RBPT	59	+69.576s	1
11	77	Valtteri Bottas	ALFA ROMEO FERRARI	59	+88.844s	0
12	20	Kevin Magnussen	HAAS FERRARI	59	+92.610s	0
13	47	Mick Schumacher	HAAS FERRARI	58	+1 lap	0
14	63	George Russell	MERCEDES	57	+2 laps	0
NC	22	Yuki Tsunoda	ALPHATAURI RBPT	34	DNF	0
NC	31	Esteban Ocon	ALPINE RENAULT	26	DNF	0
NC	23	Alexander Albon	WILLIAMS MERCEDES	25	DNF	0
NC	14	Fernando Alonso	ALPINE RENAULT	20	DNF	0
NC	6	Nicholas Latifi	WILLIAMS MERCEDES	7	DNS	0
NC	24	Zhou Guanyu	ALFA ROMEO FERRARI	6	DNF	0

* Provisional results

https://www.formula1.com/en/results.html/2022/races/1133/singapore/race-result.html

 

Click here for the 2022 Formula 1 World Driver’s (Top 10) and Constructors Championship Standings. 

 

Round 18 of the 2022 FIA Formula One World Championship returns to the famous Suzuka International Racing Course in Mie Prefecture, Japan for the Formula 1 Honda Japanese Grand Prix 2022 from Friday October 7-Sunday October 9.

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@CharlesLeclerc claims pole in slippery #SingaporeGP qualifying. #F1