Just a few days after leaving the street circuit in Baku the Formula 1 caravan was reporting for duty at another ‘coastal’ location, the demanding Marina Bay street circuit in Singapore. This was the original ‘night’ race attempted by Formula 1 and is now considered one of the most favoured venues for travelling fans - it certainly offers a dazzling spectacle. After a good finish (for Alonso) in Baku, Aston Martin were feeling quite upbeat and were hoping to capitalise on any ‘opportunities’ that may come their way in the hot & humid conditions in Singapore. The circuit had been modified slightly & resurfaced from the previous year, to make it faster, in the hope that the race wouldn’t exceed the 2-hour time limit if the required 62 laps of the race hadn’t been driven.
The race weekend was a traditional one with the 2 Free Practice (FP) sessions taking place on Friday, but much later in the day – with FP1 not starting until twilight, at 17:30 local time. Both Aston Martins went out on hard tyres initially, to start the process of collecting data, which would be fed back to the team. At about the midpoint of the session, the pair bolted on soft tyres to attempt their flying runs. During one of these Alonso pulled off an impressive save after taking too much kerb and nearly losing his Aston Martin, as the track continued to evolve and the times kept on tumbling. Teammate Stroll, meanwhile, sparked the ire of Tsunoda, when he ran slowly in the path of the RB, but nothing else came of it. At the end of the hour’s session, Alonso ended up in P9 & Stroll P15. Well into the evening, the second Free Practice session commenced and this time it was the turn of the medium tyres to get tested first on the dusty track. Again though, after some 20+ minutes into the session, both drivers put on soft tyres & finished up with Alonso down in P12 & Stroll 0.2 of a second behind, in 14th.
Both the Aston Martin drivers were the first cars to be sent out in FP3 on Saturday, initially on the medium tyre compound, in order to test out the conditions after there had been some rain overnight. However, not for long, as a scaly fan (a lizard) was parading on track! The session had to be paused briefly, as the marshals chased the reptile away & to a safe place off track. The two drivers switched to soft tyres for the last stint of the final Free Practice session, at the end of which Alonso recorded the 10th fastest time & Stroll the 18th. The all-important Qualifying session commenced as the sun set and the blazing overhead floodlights took over. All the cars commenced their attempts to ensure they got through to the next round, but Stroll was struggling with balance & grip from the get-go and at the end of the first runs he was in the drop zone, meaning the pressure was on for the second runs. Although the track began to ramp up towards the end of Q1, Stroll could not match the pace of his teammate, which led to his early elimination in Q1 & missing out on getting into the next round by just 1/10th of a second. He would start 17th on the grid. Alonso did make it safely into Q2, going 7th fastest. He was not so comfortable in the next round of Qualifying though, when after his first run he found himself in the drop zone, in P11. But still, he was able to outperform the pace of the race car with an impressive lap, just managing to squeeze into Q3 by pipping Albon to P10 by 2/100ths of a second! What was striking was that Perez, in a much faster Red Bull, also didn’t make it into Q3 and would start 13th, but potentially he would be a threat in the race the following day. In the final round, good fortune came Alonso’s way again, as shortly into the session Sainz slammed rearward heavily into the wall at the final corner and brought out the red flags. After the restart there was only time for one more flying lap & with Sainz out, Leclerc having his lap deleted for exceeding track limits & being able to outqualify Tsunoda, Alonso managed to place his AMR24 in P7. As in Baku, it looked a promising place for Alonso to start on Sunday on what would be a very physically demanding race for all the drivers. At the front, it was Norris who would start on pole, Verstappen, in a revived Red Bull, alongside him in 2nd & the two Mercedes of Hamilton & Russell behind them.
Before the race got underway there was some anxiety, when during Stroll’s reconnaissance laps, prior to taking up his grid position, he felt some vibrations on the car, so the team worked quickly to replace a set of brakes as a precaution. Maybe because of that & the decision to start the race on the slower hard compound tyre, he started the race more cautiously & soon lost a place to Gasly. Alonso though, on the medium compound tyre, had a clean start & kept himself in 7th. By lap 9 though Stroll had managed to regain a place & was back up to 17th. Then, when Sainz & Albon came into the pits for fresh tyres on lap 11, Stroll moved up to 15th, with Alonso still valiantly maintaining 7th, despite the faster Ferraris & Red Bull pursuing him. Stroll moved up a further place when Albon had to retire from the race on lap 16. Two laps later, Hamilton, who had curiously started the race on soft tyres, had to come in, which put Alonso up to P6. Shortly after, Stroll was back down to 16th, after Sainz, on his new tyres, passed him. It was then the turn of the 2 Aston Martins to come in for new rubber. First of all it was Alonso who came it at the end of lap 25, just after he was passed by Leclerc – switching to hard tyres & emerging 15th, but he gained places swiftly on his out lap. Then it was Stroll’s turn to put his car on fresh medium tyres, but he came out only 19th. His teammate upfront benefitted from other drivers ahead of him coming into the pits for their first tyre change stops and he progressed up to 9th. At just over the halfway race distance point Alonso was up to 7th, Stroll 17th. 3 laps later, on lap 36, Stroll was up to 16th & just a few laps after that Alonso was no longer able to keep the faster Ferrari of Sainz behind him & he relinquished the place to him – it was Alonso 8th, Stroll 16th. When Riccardo pitted on lap 48, that allowed Stroll to move up to 15th, who then got the bit between his teeth & passed Magnussen 2 laps later for 14th spot. It was status quo for the 2 Aston Martins all the way to the chequered flag, Alonso finishing 8th, Stroll 14th. It wasn’t a classic, but Lando Norris commandingly won the race, narrowing his deficit to Championship leader Verstappen, who finished 2nd, Piastri was 3rd.
After the race, Alonso was much lauded for extracting more from his AMR24 than all the pre-race simulations predicted, demonstrating his brilliance and not letting Perez’s faster Red Bull pass him. These simulations predicted Alonso would tumble down the order & finish outside the points. His own comments were, "It was a very physical race today, but we executed everything well and scored some good points. We tried the undercut strategy by stopping a few laps before the others and it worked quite well for us. In truth it has been a difficult car to drive all weekend and we have done very well to finish only a few seconds behind a Ferrari. We have a lot of work to do back at Silverstone in the next few weeks to try and improve our performance for Austin." Stroll’s comments were, "We knew it was going to be a tough race and we suffered from similar issues to yesterday: grip and balance. Austin is a very different circuit, so we'll hope that it is better suited to our car."
Next, F1 is off to Austin, Texas, for another Grand Prix in the United States, which will be over the weekend of 18th – 20th October & will include a Sprint Race. It will also be the first one of a triple header. I will enjoy the break.