“The life of a Mercedes Swiftie.”
And we’re back for Part 2 of another Dre Double Header and thanks to MotoGP finishing early, you can get a second DRR in a day, this time for Formula 1 and Round 18 of the 2025 Championship as the travelling circus headed to Marina Bay and the Singapore Grand Prix.
And in this edition, we had another early McLaren flashpoint as Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri come together (slightly), Max Verstappen passes his final development test, and by the way, no big deal, George Russell wins the Grand Prix despite no-one giving him a prayer on Thursday, let’s get into it!
Ruin The Friendship
You know what my favourite part of George Russell’s victory was this weekend in Singapore? The fact that when it was all said and done and Jenson Button for Sky Sports did a group interview, George had no idea how and why his Mercedes was so fast. I’m sat here writing this a good couple of hours later and I’m still not sure.
Maybe it was the new front wing they brought this weekend that might help with the downforce. It’s been well known for sometime that Mercedes have had trouble managing tire temperatures for the last season and change, but despite Singapore’s ambient temperature being north of 31 degrees, hence the first FIA-mandated “heat-hazard”* race, the track temperatures don’t get all that high as a result, and as we saw in places like Vegas last year, Mercedes like it when it’s cold.
They didn’t even look particularly strong in practice, with McLaren and Red Bull looking better on the long run sims in practice. But out of nowhere, George nailed his Q3 lap to take pole in a track record 1:29.1, Mercedes first Singapore pole since Hamilton’s famous 2018 run. I think he had potential for a Sub-29 too, given he brushed the wall on one of his two very similar quickies. He took pole ahead of Max Verstappen, who still hasn’t got a Singapore pole, with Oscar Piastri third and teammate Lando Norris fifth.
And let’s be frank, you know what we’re here for – What to make of Turn 3 and the collision between the three main title contenders?
Honestly – Much ado about nothing. If anything, Verstappen was accidentally the catalyst given he was tentative into Turns 2 and 3 on a soft tyre that Red Bull has infamously had trouble getting up to temperature. His car being relatively parked on the apex led to Norris being boxed in from two sides, and as he made minor contact with Max’s rear, the twitch led to contract with Piastri. Arguably Norris came off the worst for it with a mildly damaged front wing endplate, but Oscar was left fuming on the radio having dropped to fourth and now asked McLaren to swap Norris around.
McLaren ultimately decided “No further action”. Tom Stollard literally said it on the radio too, like they were the stewards. Oscar wasn’t best pleased and his complaints led to a classic: “We’ll discuss it after the race”. For once, I agree with McLaren Race Control, this was incidental and accidental contact and I don’t think it crossed a line into malicious intent. Oscar played it cool after the race was over with the team rightly choosing to celebrate retaining the Constructors Championship, but his frustration in the heat of the moment was hard to hide. He sounded mentally checked out stuck in fourth, and we even saw him plug his radio out as Zak Brown was congratulating the team after the race was over.
Editor’s Note: Turns out thanks to Autosport’s excellent Filip Cleeren – Oscar’s car was already shut down by the time Zak addressed the team, so he didn’t hear any of his message. Seems the video’s radio and actual footage was out of sync. PS: Oscar missing the team celebration? He finished 4th, you’re obligated to speak to the written press as part of the sport’s procedures. As questionable a look that may be, I don’t think the FOM can tell the future and predict that Oscar would finish off the podium despite the orchestrated new Constructor’s celebration.
We’re now deep into year two of McLaren being a team good enough to win races and Championships on merit. Year two of the pat-yourself-on-the-back nature of branding team orders as Papaya Rules, and I think this was as close as we’ve gotten to a mutiny. McLaren’s worked exceptionally hard to get everyone involved to buy into this, but how much longer can it last. We’ve seen:
- Lando Norris begged in to giving up a win (Hungary 2024)
- Going back and forth on asking Oscar Piastri to be a Number 2 (Baku onwards 2024)
- Norris giving up a Sprint win as a “make good”. (Qatar 2024)
- Piastri asking to lead the fight against Verstappen and being rejected (Japan 2025)
- Piastri asking for a switch because he felt his brake-test under Safety Car was unfair (Britain 2025)
- Norris winning on a 1-stop strategy that wasn’t offered to Piastri (Hungary 2025)
- Piastri being asked to switch places with Lando due to a faulty wheel gun on his bad stop (Italy 2025)
Now, it’s not lost on me that Piastri has been the vocal point of a LOT of these team orders incidents, especially as many of McLaren’s 2025 races have centered around their team being the only drivers in contention. How much patience does Piastri have? Is Lando prepared to match Piastri’s sacrifices if he’s in the hotseat, ala Hungary 2024 when he was asked to cough up a win? These are the questions you force yourself to ask when McLaren decided to go down this road of evolving “Papaya Rules” into full blown; “We’re trying to dictate the terms of engagement”. As I said before – Motorsport isn’t fair at the best of times, and it goes one step further here when you’re trying to trade equity in a stock that’s impossible to value. Where do you draw that line of intervention?
These are the questions Zak Brown and Andrea Stella have to answer. The Constructors are in the bag, but the driver’s title isn’t secure yet. Max Verstappen passed the final test – He was competitive in Singapore, a track Red Bull have traditionally struggled at and did enough to beat McLaren in qualifying and hold off Norris while under extreme pressure for half of the toughest physical race on the calendar. And while Max couldn’t win and really take the points of McLaren he needs to stay on pace for an unlikely five-peat, the proof of concept is there to show Max can take the fight to them down the stretch and they have to execute.
McLaren’s final challenge is set – Can they adhere to their team values while the best driver of the decade so far hunts them down? See, this title fight’s a lot more fun than you think…
The Lightning Round
Despite Toto Wolff saying there’s an agreement in place for 2026, a new contract still hasn’t been signed by George yet. For me, George Russell has been the best driver in F1 this season, and I’m still not fully convinced it’s worth dangling George and free agency for the sake of *potentially* getting Verstappen.
And then there’s me in the Ferrari camp thinking: “My god, we’re mediocre.” Good to see Lewis Hamilton outqualifying Charles Leclerc in Q3 for just the 5th time in 18 weekends, but then a risky two-stopper went awry when Lewis’ brakes failed, and then got cheeky to drop from seventh to eighth for leaving the track for no justifiable reason. A valid penalty given Ferrari could have parked him. But this team regressing to fourth in the running order is a sign that Fred Vasseur might not be in this job long term if this keeps up.
One of the more interesting stories heading into the weekend – Alex Dunne leaving McLaren’s driver academy with immediate effect. Turns out he had a meeting with his management and Helmut Marko in Vienna last week, and Zak was pissed when he found out.
I feel like this was inevitable, McLaren like with Gabriel Bortoleto, can’t supply their drivers with a mainline F1 seat and Indy NXT was a step beneath Dunne’s ability (Dennis Hauger, who never finished higher than eighth in F2), so the only way for me, felt like walking away. And if you’re Red Bull, I think Dunne’s a better prospect than their own Arvid Lindblad, the former hasn’t dropped off a cliff with a title campaign yet and his raw speed is the best in Formula 2 in my opinion.
I’m glad Red Bull are being somewhat sensible, likely keeping Dunne in F2 for one more season with a promise of a 2027 race seat if he wins the title. Red Bull are doing their classic strategy of farming talent and using the promise of two extra race seats to see if they can “Moneyball” another super talent ala Max… but how many sacrifices are you gonna make for that end goal?
No Safety Car for the second year in a row in Singapore after 16 straight years with one, and all 20 cars saw the flag. My god this track is really struggling now.
Fernando Alonso’s sass of threatening to turn the radio off if he got spoken too on every lap and calling himself a hero for passing Isack Hadjar who was struggling with power unit issues was hilarious.
The Verdict: 4/10 (Poor) – Not to much to report here. Kimi Antonelli and Ollie Bearman’s superb passes into the final chicane were worth a watch but beyond Lap 1, there wasn’t much to report. Little strategy, a 1-stopper with medium and soft tire overruns and… yeah, that’ll do it really. See you in Austin.
