McLaren’s Lando Norris takes dominant victory in Singapore Grand Prix

SINGAPORE (Agencies): McLaren’s Lando Norris dominated the Singapore Grand Prix from start to finish on Sunday to take another chunk out of Max Verstappen’s Formula One championship lead. The 24-year-old Briton roared away from pole position at the floodlit Marina Bay circuit and, despite living dangerously at times as he twice brushed the unforgiving walls, led every lap to the chequered flag. Verstappen finished second for Red Bull, a massive 20.945 seconds behind his main rival, and McLaren’s Oscar Piastri was third in a sweltering night race run over 62 laps in exhausting heat and humidity. Verstappen’s 59 point lead over Norris was cut to 52 with six rounds, including three sprints, remaining, while McLaren stretched their lead over Red Bull in the constructors’ standings to 41 points.

“It was an amazing race. A few too many close calls, I had a couple of little moments in the middle, but it was well controlled, I think,” said Norris after his third career victory and third of the season. “The car was mega. I could push, we were flying the whole race and at the end could just chill. So it was a nice race, still tough, I’m a bit out of breath, but a very fun one.” Norris could have also had a bonus point for fastest lap but RB’s Daniel Ricciardo pitted for a third time for soft tyres and snatched it at the end of what many suspect could be the Australian’s last race. Extraordinarily for Singapore, there was no safety car deployment in a largely incident-free race with only two retirements. “On a weekend when we knew that we were going to struggle, to be P2 is a good achievement,” said Verstappen after what amounted to a lonely race. “Of course we are not happy with second. Now we just have to try and improve more and more and that’s what we will try to do.” George Russell took fourth place for Mercedes with Charles Leclerc fifth for Ferrari and seven times world champion Lewis Hamilton sixth for Mercedes. Last year’s winner Carlos Sainz was seventh for Ferrari, ahead of fellow-Spaniard Fernando Alonso of Aston Martin and Haas’s Nico Hulkenberg with Red Bull’s Sergio Perez taking the final point. Ricciardo was 18th and gained no benefit from the fastest lap, with the point going only to those in the top 10, but could at least add another achievement to his record and help his former team mate and friend Verstappen. “Thank you, Daniel,” the champion said over the team radio when he was told.