MARINA BAY (SINGAPORE), OCT 11 (IANS): Red Bull’s Max Verstappen capped off his perfect weekend in Singapore with his first-ever Grand Prix victory at the Marina Bay Street Circuit as title leader Kimi Antonelli secured the third-place finish to have the F1 championship in sight.
Verstappen started on pole and clinched the victory on his 250th Grand Prix start with a masterclass at the 62-lap circuit to bag his second-straight win after having won the Bahrain GP in Malaysia last week.
It was a perfect week for him as he qualified on P1 for the Sprint race, then won the Sprint and also qualified on P1 for the Sunday race.
Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc started second and finished second despite being on a two-stop strategy, while Mercedes driver Antonelli was third and now has a sizeable lead over his teammate and nearest title rival George Russell, who finished P9 after starting the race from P19 for taking new power unit components and exceeding his seasonal allocations.
Antonelli, with 340 points, now has a lead of 102 points over Russell, who has 238 points following cashing in two points for the ninth-placed finish. Antonelli now has the mathematical chance of winning the title at the United States GP in Austin in the next race, and with five more races scheduled after Austin, the writing seems to be on the wall.
Meanwhile, it wasn’t a happy race for Lewis Hamilton as he dropped from P3 to P6 in the final few laps. He opted to stay on a one-stop strategy as he boxed early to change his medium compound tyres for softs. Hamilton was already one of the handful of drivers to start on the medium tyres among the top 10 on the grid.
Lando Norris tried moving past Hamilton from P4 to take P3 in lap 54 but his tyres got dirty as Antonelli went past the reigning champion. Antonelli then moved past Hamilton to take P3 as Norris also went ahead of the Ferrariman to settle for P4. Norris’ teammate Oscar Piastri took P5 after overtaking Hamilton in the closing stages of the race.
Racing Bulls’ Liam Lawson came seventh ahead of Audi’s Nico Hulkenberg as Isack Hadjar took the final place after starting the race from the pit lane.
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