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Verstappen goes full Max in Singapore

Max Verstappen was to the max in Singapore. Pole position? Check. Sprint race win? Check. First Singapore Grand Prix victory? Also check.

Meanwhile, Kimi Antonelli was doing Kimi Antonelli things. One infraction away from a track-limits penalty, wrestling with questionable brakes and a mysterious feeling in the car, the Mercedes youngster somehow managed to emerge with a podium finish. Not a bad day’s work when the machinery seems to have developed a personality of its own.

And with another third-place finish in the books, Antonelli extended his championship lead. Unless he runs into a problem with his visa and is denied entry into the United States, all he pretty much has to do is show up in Texas to put himself in position to secure the Formula 1 drivers’ championship.

But Sunday night in Singapore belonged to Max Verstappen, who finally conquered the Marina Bay Street Circuit on his 10th attempt, leading from start to finish to claim his 73rd career victory and his second consecutive Grand Prix win of the 2026 season.

The four-time world champion had finished on the podium four times in Singapore previously, including runner-up results in both 2024 and 2025. Victory, however, had remained stubbornly out of reach. Apparently, all it took was a little patience, a few upgrades and a Red Bull machine that finally remembered how to behave itself.

Verstappen’s weekend was about as close to a masterclass as Formula 1 gets. He claimed pole position, won the Sprint and then backed it all up in the main event, holding off Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc at the start before gradually disappearing into the distance.

Leclerc made Verstappen work for the lead into the opening corner, but the Dutchman’s getaway was just good enough to keep the Ferrari behind him. Once clear, Verstappen began building an advantage, leaving Leclerc to contemplate the familiar problem of watching a Red Bull become a smaller and smaller object in the distance.

The pit-stop phase offered little opportunity for drama, either. Verstappen made a clean switch from soft to medium tires, while his advantage at the front remained largely intact. Even radio problems that forced Red Bull to resort to pit-board communication couldn’t derail the afternoon.

Singapore is hardly the sort of place where a driver can relax. The heat, humidity and unforgiving barriers make it a physical and mental slog, with little room for mistakes. Yet Verstappen looked in control throughout, eventually crossing the finish line 7.3 seconds ahead of Leclerc.

“It’s taken a while, but I think this race was very good,” Verstappen said afterward. “We had pace when we needed to have it on the soft tire and on the medium, even though I think the medium tire for everyone was a bit more of a struggle.

“It worked out, so of course I’m very happy to win here.”

The result marked Verstappen’s second straight victory following Red Bull’s breakthrough win at the previous round in Malaysia. After a season that had offered considerably more frustration than champagne, the team appears to have found something useful in the updates introduced in Azerbaijan.

“I think the last few races have been really positive for us, and it’s just great to see,” Verstappen said. “We have a lot of motivation in the team to try and deliver even more results.

“It’s a really good group of people. I really enjoy working with them, and hopefully we can have a bit more fun until the end of the year.”

Leclerc had little reason to complain about his own performance, even if second place meant another opportunity to win had slipped through Ferrari’s fingers. The Scuderia initially had the pace to keep Verstappen honest, but tire degradation and a different strategy involving the Virtual Safety Car ultimately worked against the Monegasque driver.

“We were quite strong at the beginning of the race, then we started degrading a bit more in the first stint,” Leclerc explained. “Then we did a slightly different strategy to Max with the [Virtual] Safety Car.”

Leclerc pushed hard during the final stint, hoping to find a way back into contention, but the effort came at a cost.

“I believed in it until the very end, but I pushed a lot at the beginning of that last stint and degraded a bit more than the others,” he said. “I gave it all and I don’t regret anything. I don’t think there was much more to do today apart from maybe [be] a bit more aggressive at the start. That’s the way it is.”

Ferrari has made progress with recent updates, according to Leclerc, but the team still has work to do if it hopes to challenge Red Bull consistently.

“I still feel that way,” Leclerc said when asked about his earlier comments regarding Ferrari’s loss of pace. “However, it’s true that we brought some small new parts to the car which maybe helped us to do another step forward.

“It’s not enough. We’ll push to the end and we’ve still got to bring some new things to the car to be at the level. I think today we had good pace overall.”

While Leclerc had to settle for second, Antonelli’s third-place finish might have been the most consequential result of the evening.

The Mercedes driver endured a difficult weekend, with concerns over his brakes and the car’s behavior threatening to make life considerably more complicated than it needed to be. Track limits also remained a concern, leaving little margin for error on a circuit where the walls are always eager to make an introduction.

Yet Antonelli kept it together when it mattered, securing another podium and strengthening his position in the championship.

“It was not easy out there,” Antonelli said. “I felt very good on the soft [tire], but on the medium I struggled a lot. Then on the soft the pace was very good at the end; it was very, very good, so that’s a positive.”

The youngster credited Mercedes with helping turn the weekend around after a difficult start, although he acknowledged that the team still needs to understand how to get the most from its current package.

“The team did a great job on trying to turn [things] around, especially the car,” Antonelli said. “I think we can be very happy and proud of the job we did, especially looking at how we started the weekend.”

He added that the team was beginning to understand how to extract more performance from the car.

“I can say that we’re finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel with this package, and it’s just a matter of understanding which one is the best window, how to put the car in the best window, in order to extract the maximum out of the package.”

Behind the podium finishers, Lando Norris led McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri home in fourth and fifth, respectively. Lewis Hamilton finished sixth in the second Ferrari, while Liam Lawson took seventh for Racing Bulls.

Audi’s Nico Hulkenberg finished eighth, ahead of Mercedes’ George Russell, who recovered to ninth after starting toward the back of the field. Red Bull’s Isack Hadjar rounded out the top 10 after starting from the pit lane.

Pierre Gasly finished 11th for Alpine, followed by Haas teammates Ollie Bearman and Esteban Ocon. Williams’ Carlos Sainz and Racing Bulls’ Arvid Lindblad followed, with Fernando Alonso 16th for Aston Martin and Sergio Perez 17th for Cadillac.

Alex Albon was classified 18th despite retiring late in the race, while Valtteri Bottas finished 19th in the other Cadillac.

Lance Stroll, Franco Colapinto and Gabriel Bortoleto failed to finish. Stroll appeared to suffer a clutch issue, Colapinto encountered a driveline problem and Bortoleto appeared to have a gearbox failure.

For Verstappen, though, the mechanical dramas and retirement list were little more than background noise. He had finally won in Singapore, and Red Bull had now strung together two victories after a season that had threatened to become an exercise in frustration.

There is still plenty of racing left, and Ferrari clearly believes it can make further gains. Mercedes, meanwhile, has a championship contender who seems capable of turning a troublesome weekend into another valuable result.

But Singapore was Verstappen’s weekend from the moment he took pole. He won the Sprint, controlled the Grand Prix and finally crossed one of the few remaining venues on the calendar off his victory list.

Only the new-for-2026 Madring remains among the circuits on the current schedule where Verstappen has yet to win.

At this rate, somebody might want to warn the Madring to start making arrangements.

While Antonelli was clearly pleased with the on-track result, he was genuinely caught off guard when told that the upcoming United States Grand Prix could serve as his official championship clincher.

“Can I? Really?” Antonelli responded in complete surprise. “Well, let’s not worry about that.”

FORMULA 1 SINGAPORE AIRLINES SINGAPORE GRAND PRIX 2026 – RACE RESULT

Pos. No. Driver Team Laps Time / Retired Pts.
1 3 Max Verstappen Red Bull Racing 62 1:42:00.785 25
2 16 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 62 +7.335s 18
3 12 Kimi Antonelli Mercedes 62 +24.573s 15
4 1 Lando Norris McLaren 62 +40.506s 12
5 81 Oscar Piastri McLaren 62 +49.644s 10
6 44 Lewis Hamilton Ferrari 62 +53.188s 8
7 30 Liam Lawson Racing Bulls 62 +81.666s 6
8 27 Nico Hulkenberg Audi 62 +83.386s 4
9 63 George Russell Mercedes 62 +84.677s 2
10 6 Isack Hadjar Red Bull Racing 62 +90.862s 1
11 10 Pierre Gasly Alpine 61 +1 lap 0
12 87 Oliver Bearman Haas F1 Team 61 +1 lap 0
13 31 Esteban Ocon Haas F1 Team 61 +1 lap 0
14 55 Carlos Sainz Williams 61 +1 lap 0
15 41 Arvid Lindblad Racing Bulls 61 +1 lap 0
16 14 Fernando Alonso Aston Martin 61 +1 lap 0
17 11 Sergio Perez Cadillac 60 +2 laps 0
18 23 Alexander Albon Williams 59 DNF 0
19 77 Valtteri Bottas Cadillac 59 +3 laps 0
NC 18 Lance Stroll Aston Martin 36 DNF 0
NC 43 Franco Colapinto Alpine 29 DNF 0
NC 5 Gabriel Bortoleto Audi 7 DNF 0
Greg Engle
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Greg Engle

Editor at Caraganza.com
Greg is a published award winning sportswriter who spent 23 years combined active and active reserve military service, much of that in and around the Special Operations community. Greg was a writer for DriveTribe supporting Amazon's The Grand Tour and has been published in major publications across the country including the Los Angeles Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He was also a contributor to Chicken Soup for the NASCAR Soul, published in 2010, and the Christmas edition in 2016. He wrote as the NASCAR, Formula 1, Auto Reviews and National Veterans Affairs Examiner for Examiner.com and has appeared on Fox News. He holds a BS degree in communications, a Masters degree in psychology. He is currently the weekend Motorsports Editor for Autoweek and a regular contributor to Forbes.
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