Hamilton extends title advantage over Vettel with Singapore victory
Sebastian Vettel admitted he and Ferrari had not been “fast enough” as they lost further ground in the Formula One drivers’ championship standings to Lewis Hamilton after finishing only third in yesterday’s Singapore Grand Prix.
Hamilton won the race at the Marina Bay Circuit with Vettel falling 40 points behind his fellow four-time world champion with only six races of the season remaining as he was also beaten by second-placed Max Verstappen.
Vettel and Ferrari had been expected to be the dominant force in Singapore, having shone at the venue in previous years, but that failed to materialise this time around despite promising pace in practice.
The German only qualified third, but moved up to second behind pole-sitter Hamilton after passing Verstappen on the opening lap.
But an early pit stop failed to work out for him as instead of leapfrogging Hamilton as planned, he instead lost track position to Verstappen when the Red Bull Racing driver made his stop.
Vettel gradually fell away from the lead pair as he nursed his tyres to the finish, and he acknowledged he had been beaten fair and square by his rivals.
“Overall, we weren’t fast enough we didn’t have the pace in the race we tried to be aggressive in the beginning and it didn’t work out,” he said post-race.
As to where it had gone wrong for Vettel, he added: “The strategy problems don’t help obviously, I was mostly thinking about today’s race and today, the way we raced, we didn’t have a chance.
“We maybe weren’t quick enough but I said before the weekend we can only beat ourselves and I don’t think we got everything out of ourselves today.”
Hamilton had been expected to struggle both in Singapore and at the previous race in Italy, but instead he has won them both and extended his lead at the top by 23 points.
It has been an impressive transformation for Hamilton and Mercedes after they had been well beaten by Vettel in Belgium last month in the first race after the summer break.
Hamilton credited the support Mercedes had given him and Valtteri Bottas, who finished fourth, for their success in Singapore.
“The team had never given up faith and belief in me and Valtteri,” he said. “That was the longest race in my life and its a blessing. I’m just blessed.
“The Ferraris put a good fight this weekend but I’m not sure where their pace went in the race.”
The nearest threat to Hamilton’s race came when he was badly held up while trying to lap Romain Grosjean’s Haas and the Williams of Sergey Sirotkin, with the Briton having to rebuff an overtaking move from Verstappen to stay ahead.
“I was a little but unlucky with the traffic, these guys were moving and it was difficult to follow,” Hamilton said of the incident.
“Max was lucky and the guys wouldn’t let me by, my heart was in my mouth but once I got past I could put the pedal down and just had to go.”
Verstappen was content with the runners-up spot, although was frustrated he had initially lost a position to Vettel on the first lap.
“It was not bad for us. It was a shame about the first lap but the team had a great strategy so we could get to second,” the Dutchman said. “In the end, we knew second was going to be the result.”
Kimi Raikkonen was fifth in the second Ferrari, with Daniel Ricciardo’s Red Bull completing the top six.