Track Interviews - Conducted by David Coulthard

Charles, well, the heavens opened, you all had to be reactive. It looked like you had good pace there at the beginning of that Sprint race and then you were struggling towards the end. I assume the tyres were giving you some difficulty but put us in the cockpit.
Charles Leclerc: Yeah, I mean, I struggled a lot from mid-race onwards. I went towards quite an aggressive balance, on the other side of what I normally do, with quite a weak front, which was quite good for the first part of the race. But then when it dried up, I was nowhere. So it was kind of tricky at the end.

Yeah, well, you held on. We had the battle between the two McLarens who were hounding you at the end there. Did you see the coming together in your mirrors and breathe a sigh of relief?
CL: I knew I had to have a very good exit out of five because I was very weak in all right-hand corners, particularly with the front left. And I had quite a good exit, but then I checked in my mirrors and I saw red lights of the back cars of the McLarens. So, I knew that something happened. And Kimi was also very strong towards the end. So yeah, just didn't have the pace at the end.

OK, well, let me give to you your reward for finishing third in the Sprint. Charles Leclerc, congratulations. If you would like to stay here, please. Lewis Hamilton, great start to that Sprint. You had to make a decision very quickly whether to go left or right of the car in front. You made the right decision, and you were hounding the back of Max a lot at the start of that race. And then it looked a little bit like maybe with Charles, your tyres were fading towards the end.
Lewis Hamilton: Yeah, I mean, I had a mega start, which is awesome. I love driving this track in the rain and those conditions. So as soon as the heavens opened, I was like, "This is a great day." And then, yeah, I was trying to get close to him without killing my tyres. So, I wasn't really pushing that much, but I was bringing him in. And then I just realised that at this point, we've still got a long way to go. I don't think we'll be able to overtake in these conditions. There's only one line. And I backed off, and then the front right started to overheat a little bit. But then I got the controls back sorted, and then towards the end I started to push and started to close the gap. But, you know, it's a tough track to overtake.

Absolutely. What are the learnings you take away from this Sprint, second place going into qualifying later?
LH: Well, I think, I mean, we showed that we obviously have a good car. I think if we can do slightly better in qualifying, get both cars up there, I think we'll be able to really apply pressure tomorrow to both the Mercedes and the Red Bull. So, they are quick, of course, but we can be there hounding them. So hopefully we can position the car in a slightly better position in this qualifying session coming up. And yeah, also got a great crowd already, just on a Saturday. So big up to everyone here in Singapore.

Lewis, congratulations. Let me please give to you your reward for your Sprint second place. And again, if you would like to just stay here. And we'll now hear from our Sprint race winner and a man that has now won on every circuit that he's competed in Formula 1. Max Verstappen, congratulations. That's back-to-back weekends when you've lost the start and then managed to come back again. You had a grandstand seat, first of all, for George getting a little bit wide out of the final corner and then managed the race perfectly to pick up those vital eight points.
Max Verstappen: Yeah, I mean, the start was horrendous again. So that's definitely something that we need to improve on because if you have something like that tomorrow, that's your race over if nothing crazy happens. So yeah, not ideal. But then we got, of course, a bit lucky with what happened with George out of the last corner. And after that, you just want to keep it calm and under control because you know that you can't pass around here, and especially, I think, in a condition like this with the intermediates. So, we just tried to bring it home. And of course, happy to win here in the Sprint, but I also know that I want to win tomorrow and not today.

Yeah, absolutely. Grand Prix tomorrow, Grand Prix qualifying coming later. I guess we'll all be watching the clouds to try and see what sort of conditions we'll have there. But in terms of picking up a first place in the Sprint, you've now completed all the circuits in your winning ways. How does it feel to do that here in Singapore?
MV: I want to win tomorrow. I don't see this as a win in terms of actually winning a Grand Prix, you know. So we need to have a good qualifying. It will be very close with a lot of cars, I think, and we just need to try and make sure, of course, we are the best one out of them. But it will be, yeah, hopefully a good battle.

Press Conference

Max, great job, very well done. How difficult was it to manage that race in those conditions?
MV: Yeah, I mean, it was a bit weird, of course, in places where it was very wet and then in other places it was basically dry. So it's also just about managing the tyre till the end. You never, I guess, know what is the best way, but at the end of the day, I think the way we managed it was enough to win it. But at the same time, of course, when the tyres start wearing, as soon as you get onto a little bit of a damp patch, or because the rubber is, of course, falling off in some places, the corner actually becomes quite greasy because of the rubber. A tiny bit offline can cause you to go off or have a moment. So especially on a street circuit, you cannot afford to have too many moments. So it's just a management race till the end, but we, I think, managed it quite well.

You looked inch-perfect out there. I mean, I suppose except for the start. Just talk us through what happened in the opening 200 metres or so.
MV: Like always, it just doesn't go off the line. Yep, it just doesn't. We don't accelerate off the line.

OK, well, look, you've been the class of the field so far this weekend. How confident are you for quali and the Grand Prix itself?
MV: Well, I'm excited for qualifying, for sure. I want to, of course, try and fight for pole again, even though I do think that it will be a tight battle with a lot of cars, which I think is great, of course. And yeah, hope we can be in that fight. But still, we need to, of course, still do a start afterwards, and up until now we always have terrible starts. So yeah, we need to really understand what we're doing wrong there.

Thank you very much. Very well done to you. Lewis, let's come to you. Great progress from you in the Sprint, and a huge amount of that work was done at the start. Just talk us through what happened there.
LH: Yeah, congrats to Max. Yeah, I had a really good start. The grip was, on the formation lap when we pulled away, I felt like there was a lot of grip. So I decided to change my procedure for the main start, and as the lights were on, I was like, "I don't know if this is going to work." And then it did. So, I got a mega pull-away, chose the inside line, and everyone seemed to be braking early. So, it was pretty straightforward. And after, I had really good pace, holding on to Max, but there's basically one line here, and so overtaking is very, very difficult. And yeah, also to overtake the most powerful engine on the grid is not so easy either. So yeah, I just had to consolidate and hold on to second.

And how difficult was it to keep the tyres alive for the full 20 laps?
LH: The first part was relatively easy, and I was just managing behind Max. But then through the middle sector, it was completely dry. I probably pushed a little bit more than Max through that section, and then the right started to grain a little bit. And so then I had to pull back, and that's where Max extended that gap. And then I made some adjustments to the setup on the steering wheel and then managed the last few laps. I started to close the gap to him a little bit. But yeah, I'm just really happy to have recovered from what was a bad qualifying yesterday. And I hope that we can make the right changes so that we can be more competitive in the next session.

Well, how much potential does the car have?
LH: I think we have the potential to fight with Max for the front row at least. I mean, whether or not we can actually be ahead of them, we shall see. But I think the car is good here, and it's just really, you need to nail that, you need to get the setup right. And I think we were quite out of bed at the start of FP1. Normally, when we start practice, we usually have a car in a good place, but it wasn't in a good place. We had to then make lots of changes, and then it's a bit of just rolling the dice. And I think we were just massively overbalanced in qualifying. But I think we've learned from that, and I hope that, as I said, going into qualifying, we should be in a nice place.

OK, very well done to you. Thank you, Lewis. And Charles, let's come to you now. You said a moment ago that it wasn't so easy for you out there. Just what were the main issues?
CL: Probably opposite to what Lewis had. I think we had quite different cars, and yesterday for me that was quite positive, but today I struggled massively. I mean, front tyres, I had no fronts from lap 10 onwards and just struggled a lot to find any rotation anywhere on track. And so unfortunately, I was trying to save, but even by saving, I was just putting way too much energy in the front tyres. So, I just struggled quite a lot towards the end.

What does that mean going forward for qualifying if it's on a dry racetrack?
CL: If it's on a dry racetrack, I'm not going to change the car too much. I think some fine-tuning here and there. I know where to improve it on the dry. If it's wet, then we'll have to take a decision, and yeah, quite a big one.