P1 with Matt and Tommy - Singapore GP Race Review

Episode Date: October 5, 2025

What looked like a relatively dull race on paper actually threw up plenty of interesting talking points - from a fantastic winning drive to the gloves well and truly coming off at McLaren...The Delusion Tour is ONE MONTH AWAY! We're heading to North America in a few weeks and there are still a few tickets available - click here to grab yours: tix.to/p1liveYou can listen to an extended version of THIS EPISODE over on our Patreon! You'll also access to every P1 episode ad-free, early access to tickets & merch, and access to our Discord server where you can chat with us and other F1 fans! Click here to sign up now: http://patreon.com/mattp1tommyFollow us on socials! You can find us on Twitter, Instagram, Twitch, YouTube and TikTok. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello everybody and welcome back to the P1 podcast with Matt and Tommy. Singapore is done. It's dusted. It was, I was going to say interesting. It was a race. It was a race happened. It was a long race. To be fair, your heart rate was probably higher than what it has been for a lot of the races this year

because your boy max for Stappen, of course, very much in the only bit of thick of things. I was about to say that. In the thicker things, but the only bit that we really saw that was anything remotely interesting. But that's Singapore for you. At least we've got a sprint next year. Hey. Oh my God. Yeah.

Singapore is just such a difficult trek to overtake on 2025. Very much feels like, you know, it's a qualifying season and then first into the first corner unless it's certain other tracks where you can overtake. So fingers cross fast. But not the best race, but still plenty of talking points, which is always good for us, of course. Now, before we're diving to everything, Formula One, Singapore related, just a quick. reminder if you're tuning in, you're only tuning to the race reviews. Firstly, where the hell have you been? But secondly, we are going to the US and Canada in less than a month now.

So come and see us with the P1 Live, delusion tour. Tickets are available. We'd love to see you there. And also, a quick shout out to our wonderful patrons who will be getting extra chat at the end of this and every race review this year. And we've got lots of questions. And some of those will be answered in the additional part. But don't worry, if you're not a Patreon, you still get lots of chatter,

which you're going to get right about now. Tom Bellingham, your most memorable moment, please. It's the Muck incident, the McLaren incident on lap one. Finally, a little bit of spice adding to the championship. We have said this the whole time, haven't we, about McLaren are playing far too nice. And, look, Landau's move is getting a lot of heat online as always, you know it should do it's a championship yeah and it should do it's a championship fight and

I basically basically my take on this is it's it's on the edge it's a little bit you know he's he's racing hard he's racing hard I can't sit here and after basically criticizing Lando for many many times over the his whole career really about him being on the wrong end of every kind of incident and in being far too nice in wheel to wheel moments and not really going for it. Finally, we saw a bit of bite from Lando Norris who knows that his only opportunity is realistically going to be on that first lap. And he saw an opportunity on his teammate who he was going for the world championship against. I watched that and was like, well, absolutely, finally, we're seeing this because, yeah, it's on the edge, a little bit naughty, but it's

It's racing that you want to see drivers want the world championship. And I'm personally really glad to see that moment. And not just because of Maxa's Sapan and hoping it's going to completely blow over between the two of them. Yeah, come on. The realistic thing here is that you're happy that Lando got through on Oscar because it's more points that Max has gained on the championship leader. But no, in terms of the incident itself, if we're talking about just what happened, not any other race, but what happened there and then, it is a racing incident. hands down. I don't think there's any real calls

for five second penalties to be given out for that. It is the definition of racing with the fact that yeah, Lando went in a little bit hot into turn two. Is it turn two or turn three? Technically, I don't know. Turn three. Yeah. Yeah. It's the left hand. It's turn two. It looks like turn two.

But yeah, it goes in a little bit deep. Touches Max ever so slightly. Max didn't even have a clue, by the way, that that Lando had made contact with his rear. He just thought he maybe had a bit of overstere. And then that, of course, then led to Lando, sort of washing, slightly wide, hitting Oscar quite hard. It was a pretty big love tap, maybe not a lot of love between the two after this weekend.

And then Oscar, of course, lost out there. That is what we want to see in terms of racing. We want to see them pushing hard. And yes, sometimes we'll banging. It's for the championship. And it was a bit of spice. It's exactly what we want to see from, like, as a fan, as a spectator. To see that. However, on additionally to this, of course, Oscar was very aggrieved by this because his lovely papyrals teammate has just hit the hit his car and got through.

But this is a separate incident. This is a separate conversation. Yeah, 100%. Racing incident, but I also absolutely understand why Oscar's annoyed. But I thought we played for fair on this. Playing fair the whole time. We're meant to, because that the whole public. Piper rules is you race your teammate hard, but you don't make contact. So his understanding of that incident is, well, he's made contact and he's basically barged me out the way. And it actually looks much worse. When you see the whole incident, this is why, you know, I think it's a racing incident.

It looks worse from Oscar's onboard so I can understand why he's even more angry in the car because he can't see that he's almost gone, that Lando's almost gone into the back of Max Stappen. And that's why he's kind of avoided that and run wide. But yeah, you're right. It's completely different incident. You can see it that I need to give props to Lando because I've been saying forever and even in that last race. You know, why isn't he going for moves?

He's trying to win the World Championship. We had a question, I'm sure it was last week going, does Lando even want to win this World Championship? And we've gone, yeah, like, he doesn't seem to want to. And then today, I can't then now criticize him for basically getting his elbows out and trying to wrestle for, position at the start, which we know what Singapore's like. It's the only opportunity to go for a move. So, yeah, it was great to see. Yeah, so this was always going to happen. This papaya rules, but then on top of that, this fairness rule thing that we said was going to backfire immediately when they started to introduce that. And this is exactly what's happened. Because Oscar is well

within his rights to question what on earth is fair now if that is deemed fine. If wheelbanging is fine, then you're basically just back to, okay, we're just going to race now then. It's such... And it's very interesting that Zach has basically openly said, it's hard racing. So now we go into these kind of final races, that we've basically got a level of this is fair.

You can bang wheels. That's not help the allegations of that McLaren want Lando to win the World Championship. No. When Oscars on the wrong end, of this particular incident. But yeah, six races to go. I firmly believe that we may well have seen the end of

Nicely Nicely McLaren. Question from P1, Patreon member Zingy 13. Are the gloves finally off at McLaren? This is what we have been asking for all season. Will we see them come to blows in the upcoming races? I firmly believe so. Look, we're six races out now from the end of the championship. Lando is within a race win.

Now, 22 points behind his team. teammate and Lando has to do what we saw on lap one every single race. If he's behind his teammate, he needs to get his elbows out and he needs to show that he wants to win this world championship and not accept McLaren Nicely Nicely rules or, oh, I'll just give up three points or six points or seven points or whatever it is to Oscar. Oscar on the other side is going to think after this, well, screw this, I'm not going to be letting my teammate through at Monza because he had a slow pit stop, which I still reflect from that. Just the most busy. ridiculous thing after watching F1 for 25, 30 years.

I think the driver's gloves are off at McLaren, but McLaren will be like, no, no, no, we're still playing fair. Happy, happy, we've won the constructors. By the rules we've made within the team. But I think this is where we see perhaps, and I think is absolutely fair for the drivers, and especially Oscar Piastri after the situation to go, we'll see about that one. Yeah, absolutely. the Constructors' Championship has been won now. It is a ridiculous kind of thing to even suggest they were never going to win it. It wasn't like last year where it was a little bit closer and they were dropping points here

and the gap closed. They're always going to win it. It was just a matter of when it was going to happen and it's been done now. So I was going to say, I hope that McLaren now just let them leave them to it and let them race. But I think crucially here, Zach Brown's, comments after that and saying what Lando did is just hard racing, that's it. Like, it's game on now of what you're allowed to do. And, you know, as we've seen and as we mentioned at the start of this show about, oh, Singapore, what a stinker. But so much of this season has been about

turn one, you know, Max Verstappan at Imola, making that move on Piastri, Piastri, on Max de Stappan at Saudi. So many of these races, have been won by turn one or the first because it is the best opportunity to overtake with these cars that are so difficult so difficult to pass now with with dirty air and stuff so this this does open you know a very kind of drivers are surely going to be aggressive now Oscar can now use this for a way to be like well yeah okay I'll be aggressive now and now this is the precedent that's set of like this is the limit that's okay so very nice indeed love to see it finally we said i think last last week sorry last last last race we kind of um

no sorry sorry i think it's monza actually where we were basically talking about we're maybe just going to have to reset our brains and think well this is just going to be the mcclaren way that it is going to be holding hands and skipping to the constructors championship and that's the way McLaren are going to play it. But I think something's changed there. And I also think it's even more dangerous to go down this route of setting precedence because you're always going to upset a driver

and today Oscar was the one upset. Just letting them race, I feel is a safer bet. Obviously you've got max now, 63 points behind Oscar Piastri in the championship, trying to manage these two drivers that both don't have a world championship under their belt, I just feel like it's going to get worse

if they genuinely are on the same piece of tarmac for the next six races. Surely it's safer to just go, guys, we trust you. I know you're both two number one drivers. You might come together, but until then, just go be free. For only if there was a multiple world champion

and a super aggressive driver that's kind of slowly getting into the mix and quite a lot of points behind but gaining, wouldn't that be fun? We'll talk about him later anyway. Yeah, we certainly will. Next question, P1, Patreon, member, Glush. Is Oscar in the right about the Lap One incident?

Norris seemed to go in just a tiny bit too hot towards the back of Max, which made him take evasive action. Yes, these two things can coexist of, I think it's a racing incident, and Lando's got every right to barge his championship rival out the way. But the reason Oscar asked the question is because McLaren have, really pushed this hole. We've got to race fair. You're not allowed to make contact with your teammate. You're not allowed to do this. We're always going to reset positions and slow pit stops.

You need to let someone back through. And there's even a little bit of it today where they were that they basically won the championship now and they were going to win the championship and that. And they were still asking questions of like, oh, we might lose a place to LeClaire here on an undercut. So should we do this? I know they want to bag as many, points as possible for that championship and it's all about that's the way they play it and it's all about the team but I do hope they just let them just get on with it now and we don't need to see this but Oscar has every right to ask that question I think just because of how McLaren have been playing it and the way they've basically like that whole papaya rules thing that we've seen

for the last couple of seasons he's got every right to kind of question it I think to go back very quickly to you saying Lando has every right to barge his teammate out the way I think that probably we should put a word of unintentionally barge his teammate because it was an unintentional race race yeah I think just just clear Tommy is not saying

I'm a match for Safflin fan but not that much for Yeah exactly Because it was racing Lando did not mean to hit Oscar He of course it was clumsy and it was his responsibility to not make that contact but it wasn't enough intentional and slamming my teammate out the way, basically.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. So back to the thing, Oscar was absolutely right, because of everything that McLaren have said, he was right to question it, he was right to feel aggrieved. Had that been anyone else other than his teammate, probably would again still had a comment over the radio, but I think he himself would know that that would not be a penalty.

And I think that when he's able to review it all and see exactly what happened, because of course he's commenting from the cockpit, where his teammate has hit him. He doesn't know the Max incident as well. The full context and perhaps, even though to be fair, he did say, oh, so he was avoiding Max and then crashing into me, how is that fair? So perhaps he does know the full context, but I wonder.

He was very PR friendly in the interview. Oskar knows exactly not to get a headline. But yeah, I wonder what he really truly thinks. Maybe we just go ask Mark Weber. Can he come on the podcast, please? Next question. Gavin Curley 90. If Lando had been on the receiving end of the first corner,

would McLaren have called for Oscar to give back the position? I know so many people would be like, yeah, without a shadow of a doubt, Zach Brown would have made the call as CEO to get Lando back through. I'm not as confident to say that. I don't know. This is a if-butts may be different universe. You know, Lando is not being favoured in every way

in the sense of like you think of the pit stops that he's had. he's not you know they're not sabotaging oscar in the pit lane of course oscar did have a bad pit stop this race but but lando has had his fair share of um you know bad fortune in the pit lane so it's uh it's a dangerous question because it it goes down the route of i don't know what i need to see is another very similar incident but lando is the one that's not is on the receiving end of that and then we can truly weigh in but i think it's uh it's hard to say um but i would like to think no. Well, I saw slightly tongue in cheek messages about how, because Oscar had a slow pit stop and then finished the amount of his slow pit stop less than that behind Lando, then it's like,

oh, well, what's what's fair then and stuff like that? Look, I think with Lando, there's no doubt in my mind that Zach Brown would prefer Lando to win the championship. Agreed. But I don't think McLaren are basically going to, particularly as Oscar is ahead and Maxa Stappen is kind of lurking in the background that they're going to completely throw Oscar's championship away because, you know, as you mentioned, there's been moments this year where you can kind of go, oh, that that's in favour of Lando, you know, the Monsor incident or there's been moments where like the Todd Piastri to back off when he's trying to race Lando and things like that or like cool, cool off and things like that. But then equally,

Landos had about four or five slow pit stops in a row and that doesn't fit the narrative, does it? And Landau helped Oscar in Baku, if I'm not mistaken as well, was told to help him obviously last year. Last year, yeah, of course. Yeah, yeah. So there are moments where

it's not like it's, you know, Team Landau and that's it. No, I didn't think it is. Like, you know, I'm not going to sit here and pretend that I think that it's completely equal because it's quite clear that that Lando is very much Zach's boy, isn't he?

And you do get that in teams. But McLaren at the end of the day are allowing both of their drivers a shot of the World Championship. They have their papaya rules, which, you know, in theory lets them race and, you know, if they wanted Lando to win the World Championship,

they could have easily just throw Oscar's championship down the toilet and just really back Lando right from the start based on, on, you know, what happened last year or something. But they haven't. They've continued to let them race, and we now wait and see, you know, how it continues. Yeah, because as well, McLaren don't want to lose, well, I don't think they do, want to lose

a talent in Oscar Piastri to another team. They've got two incredibly strong drivers that are doing very, very well. Yes, they're not probably the finished package, but they are, you know, they've delivered a Constructors championship by an absolute landslide. They've matched Red Bulls, constructors, you know, amount of races left record from 2023. That's no mean feat. So, yeah, it's a difficult one. I know for a fact there'll be tons of comments saying, absolutely, Lando is the number one golden child at McLaren.

But it's a very dangerous thing for McLaren to actively try and sabotage Oscar. And I think it would be very stupid for a team to do that. Particularly as he's the one with the points advantage, right? Yeah, because there is six races to go. could absolutely beat Lando in the championship. There is a chance there that that could happen. So McLaren cannot go this year without a world champion, even if.

It'd be the most embarrassing fumble of all time. And they've probably arguably done it already, McLaren, so they don't want to do it again. 2007 for context. Okay, all right. Not last year, everybody. No, no, no, no. That was maybe...

Tommy, when you're dropping law, you have... When you're dropping law, you have to say, which year. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Not everyone has watched it since 2007. You absolute boomer. Next question, P1, patron member, Blackson. Should Norris have taken more risk to get past for Stappen?

Or is he measuring the risk versus reward in rather chipping away than going for glory? The latter. I can't criticise Lando one bit for not going for a move on Max for Stappan. If he goes for it and it goes wrong, basically Oscar Piazsche has won the World Championship because Oscar moves in second place and it's a DNF for both Max and Lando. So I totally understand why he didn't go for that move. It is risk versus reward. Of course, it would have been great for him to, you know, for his championship to get even more points on Oscar Piastri.

But, you know, I can criticize him for Baku and not doing it on Yuki Sonoda and Liam Lawson, a track where you can overtake and it showed overtaking was possible even though it was difficult. This track so, so, so hard to overtake that you have to be so sure or you. you have to have Isaac Hadjar with half an engine or Lewis Hamilton on soft tires or no brakes to be able to overtake. That's what we saw in that race. So it was risk versus reward and I think you did the right thing, just not going for something stupid personally. Yeah, and I think there will be people that go, okay, how can you say you're fine with this one, but then criticize him for Baku, but I feel as you say, two very different scenarios. Baku was difficult and he was stuck

in a DRS train, but like there were a lot more opportunities, I think. than what we saw in Singapore. Also, he's trying to overtake the guy that literally said, I'll remember this one for him. If that's playing in his mind, then Max is doing exactly what Max does and he's gaining advantages off the track as well as on. But I think that Lando understood his situation.

He was ahead of Oscar, which he would have taken every day of the week after qualifying. And I think it was the correct decision. He got very close at one point, didn't he? He went to the outside of Max. And there was no chance. of getting through. He had to pray for Max's tires to fall off even more. Of course he had the offset

of around six, seven laps on those hards. But yeah, it was the right decision. Lando gains on Oscar marginally. And he can go to the next race in Austin, hoping for a little bit more. Next question. P1 patron member Haskeh, Oscar

villain arc incoming. So final question on the McLaren shenanigans. Yeah, I think so. And maybe this is just because I want to entertainment. I don't want to see the nicey stuff. I want to see them just literally both just be

going at it for the world championship. That's all I want. And this is what I've always ever seen in Formula One when two drivers have gone up against each other. It's no team intervention. It's just all right, I see a gap. Let's go for it. Let's see what happens. So for me I think Oscar, as much

as he was very PR friendly in the interviews, he will understand now that wheelbanging is acceptable. So we can tick that one. Lovely. hard racing, tick that. And hopefully it will make for better entertainment for everyone watching as well. I hope so, yeah. I think we'll see the villain arc in the sense that, yeah,

he now knows that Will banging is okay and his team principal. It's confusing because that Brown acts like he's team principal. He's not team boss CEO. You know, as basically said, that's racing, hard racing. So that's allowed now. But I, you know, as we're recording, we're yet to see if Oscar had any. damage from it. I'd be amazed if it was, but I think you had opportunities there. I don't think

you would have been able to pass Lando just because it's so difficult to pass, but I really expected Oscar to catch up and potentially be on the back of Lando at the end of that race, and maybe that could have been an opportunity to put him under a bit of pressure and, you know, give one back on Lando based on what happened because Max was really, really struggling at the end there. And Oscar just looked a little bit off the pace this weekend. And look, I do think we can say about the Villanac, and I don't think it's absolute panic stations for Oscar Piastri. That's not what I'm saying at all.

But if we go back to the Dutch Grand Prix when Oscar Piastri won, we were talking about, is the championship over? As Oscar Piastri won, he brilliantly won the Dutch Grand Prix. Very, very comfortably. You know, Lando had the failure, which knocked him a huge chunk of points down and we're kind of thinking right this is oscar's championship to win and since then you know didn't had the the incident in in monza with with lando where they of course swapped over over that but oscar was slower in that race then we got to azabajan and you know had the worst race he

could possibly have ever had there and then you're going to singapore and he's not even on the podium. So you've got to say his form is not, you know, it's not great. And I don't think it's like panic stations he's crumbling, but I was one of these people that thought, as we get into the later stages, Oscar Piastri's mentality and him being like the ice man is going to be the thing that wins him the world's championship. But actually, we saw him, you know, not on the pace and seemingly very frustrated and you know constant radio messages seemingly very very unhappy with everything we talk about potential damage it was lando that had the visible damage if we haven't actually mentioned that you know he was the one yeah the end plate damage and still was able to to be flying

at some points during that race although we know the m plates as george russel object and the the cool down room that as soon as you your own plates hanging off like Ferrari you suddenly go quicker he's like yeah better flex I think lando said whether he actually went fast I'm not sure. But yeah, so I don't highly doubt Oscar would have got damage from that. It was wheelbanging. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, he was just slow in comparison to Lando, of course.

But he still picked up a good amount of points and didn't lose much to Lando. So for him, it's a sort of a building of confidence to some degree after Baku. He wasn't miles off. He's still outqualified Lando. So I don't think it's all terrible for Oscar. But it's definitely, it's not got the best form at the moment. Absolutely not, but he still leads the championship by a healthy margin. Now we go to my most memorable moment.

Goodness gracious, it's taken a while, but we've got here. And mine, of course, is my boy, Max Verstappen, gaining points again in the championship. And it does need to be spoken about. Max very, you know, writing off his chances after it saying, you know, he needed to win and this, that and the other. He is not going to say in the media, I'm going to win the championship, because it is a very massive. massive outside chance. But he gained points around Singapore, which we said, leading up to Singapore,

if he gains points, if he beats the McLaren's, then his championship on. We did not expect to George Russell to just dominate the entire weekend. Yeah, Bessadie is just winning out of nowhere in the hottest race. Yeah. George said himself that

it was one of the races that he would have put himself as least likely to win. and he's gone and done it. It is very much rolling of the dice for Mercedes of when they're quick and when they're not. But that's a factor in the next six races, themselves, Ferrari, if they just stop disintegrating.

And perhaps it's just these moments can change things and getting a George Russell coming out of nowhere or two Ferraris or whoever it might be, suddenly the points swings, point swings can be more, but they also can be less if you don't win the race. So Max only gained six points on Piastri, three points on Lando. But I think you would have taken this coming into Singapore, Tommy,

knowing that the points gap has come down, not come down enough to even start to get excited, I don't think. But 63 points, it's not impossible. It's not. I'm so conflicted because of basically, the way this podcast has gone since basically Monza, he won and it was kind of spoken about of like oh max championship and it's like no absolutely not it's just an outlier red bull are really good at these kind of circuits he's not 20 seconds clear then he goes

and wins back here and oscar piastri doesn't finish and i said like when we get to singapore if he beats them there we'll know and it will feel a bit more like championship back on that being said i share his thoughts of like he needed to win and there's there's talk there of you know fine margins and qualifying if he'd like led. Could he have won the race? Very difficult to pass. Not to take anything away from George. We'll speak about him later and was, you know, absolutely brilliant. But he did gain on McLaren at what should have been his worst track, really, from the ones left. And McLaren, he'd never admit this, but if you said, what would you prefer, Max winning and having the

points, or the McLaren's having a bit of an incident and it just puts, that little bit more pressure on the fact that they're going to start potentially maybe squabbling a little bit and racing each other harder, that is also what Max needs because if he's going to do a Kimmy Rykin in 2007 where the McLarence were fighting and Kimmy came out of nowhere and won the championship, and we've seen this before way back in the 80s as well with Williams, that you need the teammates to fight because Max realistically, I know. know we have this kind of scenario, although I guess

that's gone now because he didn't win the Singapore Grand Prix, but he's going to really need a Piastri DNF or at least finishing seventh or eighth again because he's not going to win all the remaining races. He needs some good fortune as well. I think he's got a chance

at winning a few of those remaining races. You look at what's left. Texas is very strong at. Mexico is one of his best circuits. Interlagos is one of his best circuits. Vegas. Vegas, maybe not.

Now, Charlotte, Clair, isn't that one. But McLaren is very, you know, traditionally weak around there. Katahe is McLaren all day long, and Abu Dhabi is a bit of a mixed bag. So I don't just, I guess I like a broke a record. We need to wait till Austin. We need to wait till the end of the season. We need to wait to Austin. And then we'll know if Max can win.

That's what you're saying. I will say that it is ideal timing that Oscar and Lando had had this contact. Not fisticuffs, but absolutely. But it's just put this whole nicely,

nicey stuff into turmoil. And I agree. I think Max needs an Oscar Piastri stinker because as I said earlier, I think Max can beat Lando in the championship if he mounts a massive charge in the next six races. So he doesn't,

so we've got six left. And to be honest with. So. Yeah. So Max will, let's say, theoretically. He wins every single race between now and the end of the season. He can have Lando finished second in all of them and he'll beat Lando in the championship. So he would only need, like, it's...

But he wouldn't be Oscar. So yeah, he needs Oscar to have the stinker. I know we're dreaming. But this is, this deserves its time. Because if Max had fallen back to 75 points behind, this can be put in the bin and we can never speak about it ever again. And I can put my Ferrari top back on. But this...

Yeah. it's weird how it's like it's ramped up the fact that he can do it more because he's beaten the McLaren's at a track he realistically shouldn't have beaten them and I think a lot of that anyway is mainly because you can't overtake there because clearly the McLaren's were

faster or at least Lando was a lot faster and would have passed him at maybe any other traditional circuit but he didn't grab that kind of big haul of making it a seven point or a 10 point or on Piastri that he kind of needs. You know, I'm worried about two things here. Well, I'm not worried about the claim that I made of getting a tattoo if he wins.

Yeah, so everybody knows, in case you weren't tuning into the watch-along, Tommy has agreed that he will get a tattoo to celebrate Max's 2025 World Championship win, should he win. So that is, I'm here for it. What I am concerned. And it's on your left-arse cheek, right? Yes, so no one will ever see it. So the... I might.

Sorry, Kevin. So, I've lost my own-street for a second. I've lost my own-throat thought now. You're going red. You go red. I can't remember what's saying. What was I saying? Oh, something about Max being great.

It was, um... It was... Oh, my God. I literally can't remember. Points. Singapore. It was, all I can think of

is now an ass tattoo. Well, how it was brought up was the fact that, you know, Max winning the championship. So, honestly,

it's just completely gone. You've lost it. It's completely gone. I can remember it later, yeah. Yeah, you'll come back to it. But let's go to a question from Fresh Pie F1.

Did Max do enough today to stay in the championship hunt? I've remembered what it was. It was, it was, it was, It was the fact that I am slightly concerned now that those points lost in Spain with this moment of madness could potentially now be the thing that we do look back on and go, oh, if only he had. Or even if, you know, that incident of like, you know, because if he does, I still think the championship is a huge stretch, but.

It'd be 54 behind. Yeah, yeah. And that's just over two wins, which is not out the question. Did Max do enough today to stay in the championship hunt? This is such a ridiculous answer, but it's kind of like a yes and no, as we mentioned earlier. Like, yes, he did. Ish, yeah.

Yes, he did because he beat the McLaren's at a track he shouldn't have, but he didn't gain enough that he needs to. But then you can argue that where he's going to gain on McLaren, big points, this would have been the track that you kind of thought he might almost like damage limitation and he only wants to lose maybe three or four or five to McLaren and it's just about kind of staying in there so yeah he's gained he's he's taken points out again you know to think he was a hundred and four points behind at the summer break and madness you know no one no one was even giving this a prayer so yeah yeah if we were being

realistic coming into Singapore, it was either, this kind of feels like the maximum, from a realistic perspective, Max could have done. Anything else was championship over in my head. A massive 10-point swing at Singapore wasn't on the cards, at least when we came into this. We did not think that was going to happen. So I would say yes in the fact that we are still talking about it, and he is still within a very outside chance of doing something crazy. But that is all it still is. Tommy's not swinging his t-shirt around his head at the moment. I just said t-shirt. But it might well happen after Austin if both Oscar Orlando collide.

And then it's 38 points with five to go. Oh my God. Yeah, it is one of those, I think it's basically, it's a situation where if it's any other driver, we're probably not even talking about it even being possible. No, but it's max. We need to. It's fun. It's fun, exciting.

And we're Formula One fans and it's nice to think about the hypothetical. That's cool. Even if he doesn't do it, it's very unlikely that he does. It's that disruptor of making McLaren sweat a bit more and feeling like they can't just have their easy championship where McLaren can control it and make it, you know, do what they want. Because they can't, McLaren can't afford to do too much where they're swapping positions and backing off too much.

It's not like a situation where it's like, you know, like Mercedes. these years ago where they're 700 points clear or whatever. This is, this is, you know, the championship is there to be one if McLaren do start messing around and potentially have like a DNF like. Let's head to a chat about George Russell, for sure, because I think he absolutely deserves it. George Russell dominated this weekend. Qualifying was, as we said yesterday, two laps that were phenomenal.

Of course, it won't go down is in the history books for. certain laps in F1 history that you just look back on and go, wow, that was a lot. But I don't think it was far away. George was brilliant yesterday. And then today, just completely unfazed. This is a track where he has crashed in the last few laps when he had a chance to win. And still showed the mental strength of just getting over that, moving on. He's a man that definitely struggles with heat as well.

I can absolutely feel the bloke. He is British. He's a hot man. He's a hot man. He's a British through and through. And you could tell he was absolutely. finished at the end of that one, but still kept his composure, didn't make any mistakes, and could have at times.

Max was within three seconds in that second stint, but he just kept it within the white lines and kept out of the barriers and you really could not have asked any more of George. And you kind of forget that he crashed in FP1 as well. Yeah, it was 20th in FP2, wasn't he, I think. And yeah, we were basically talking about how Mercedes aren't really anywhere and Fernando Alonzo could challenge maybe for a really good points finish because Mercedes are nowhere

and George ends up winning the race and this isn't to take anything away from him but he won it in qualifying which is much of the case that we see in Formula One but it's not to take anything away from him because my God what a lap what are two laps that he did were absolutely brilliant and he put himself in that position

and again I'll say yesterday that's for me that's not a it's not a situation where you go, oh, Mercedes were comfortably the best car. It's not like a Vegas where you thought, oh, Mercedes has come out of nowhere. They're comfortably the best. That's George Russell, putting a brilliant qualifying lap when he had an opportunity to do it. And this is what great drivers do when there's something we have applauded Maxis Stappen for Lewis Hamilton for in the past, that when the car isn't quite there, they still take that opportunity.

and yes, the Mercedes was better than it has been in previous races, but yeah, he won the race brilliantly, and that's what the great drivers do. And I'll say it again that we did yesterday, that give him a championship-winning car, and yeah, I think he'll win a championship for sure. And sign his blooming contract, Mercedes. Give him what he wants for crying out loud.

He's a brilliant driver asking probably for some commitment from the team, and just got to give it to him. You just really do. Like what more does he need to do? He's beaten Kimmy Antonelli comprehensively with Kimmy's massive hype into the season. And yeah, I think that George really does deserve his props for that one. Next question. P-on-Petri member, Rosie Rangetsu.

What on earth are they thinking giving Singapore a sprint next year? Between the difficulty overtaking around this circuit and the dirty air, surely it will be a stinker. I can categorically say, so, so confidently that it won't be worth watching. It will straight... But please tune into our stream.

Yeah, no, just listen to the podcast afterwards. Honestly, what is there to bring with a Singapore sprint? It'll be lap one, turn one. And it's been a reminder, obviously, after watching this Grand Prix, like, were they throwing a dart

at a board of like, who's going to get the sprint this year? Oh, it's not Brazil. Singapore. Also, we never popped off about Brazil not having a sprint, by the way. We did not pop off about Brazil not having a sprint. It's absolutely ridiculous. Yeah, it is. Maybe it's a briefcase.

But Singapore, sprint next year, disaster waiting to happen. I honestly, just not happy about it, to be honest with you. It's going to be hotter as well, isn't it? It'll be in the daytime. Yeah. Just everything about it sounds horrendous. But here we are. Maybe next year all the cars will be able to overtaken.

It'll be the best race of the year. But I don't think it will be. No, it won't because we've had, you know, the previous regulations, Singapore's always been a really, really difficult track to overtake at. Even in previous regulations, we've seen how hard it is to pass. This is before we've had arguably one of the, you know, the worst years for dirty air and overtaking that we've seen in a long time. And yet, yeah, Singapore, even before that, still didn't deliver.

And, yeah, it's just a terrible, I genuinely, I don't think it's even unfair to say that other than Monaco, I think it's literally the worst sprint you could possibly pick. And if anything, Monaco Sprint would at least be kind of silly. Yeah, it'd be like overly silly, whereas this one just feels like a waste of a sprint, to be honest with you. Right, let's head to another question. P1PATR member, Funky Guy. Why did the TV direction miss Lewis versus Fernando?

They need to get it together. because they're too busy zooming in on the driver's girlfriends than watching the racing. And I'm so bored of having this conversation all the time about how the TV directors lack any kind of wheel knowledge. But when everyone can see, I can forgive them for certain moments where we were maybe missing Hamilton's fight back. We saw it in the mini box, but we kind of wanted to see it full screen, but I understand why they were showing. for Stappan and Lando because if they'd missed that move, it would have been really embarrassing and they are obviously championship contenders and it was for second place.

So I do get that to a point. But there's absolutely no excuse to miss the fact that Lewis Hamilton has no breaks at the end of the race. You can see the gap going down. You can see it on the timing tower. How many times do we have this conversation about you can see what's happening from just looking at the timing tower? Whoever's in charge of pressing the buttons of what cameras they need to be showing,

just needs to focus on the timing tower. We don't even need to have some person in their ear telling them a million things that are happening. Just look at the timing tower and you see gaps and go, oh, they're at this part of the track, there's the gap, show that because they're about to overtake. It's just common sense. For me, I feel like this example points more towards archaic processes

than will knowledge. I think that, you know, it was very obvious. all you had to do was literally listen to a team radio or anything in the last few laps to know that Lewis was losing an insane amount of time. Just chuck it in the mini box. I'm sorry, but, you know, we're talking about Stefano Domenicali and all these comments he's made about,

oh, young people don't like watching long races. Because we don't see any of the, people don't want this, don't want that. That's why. Yeah, you need to also understand that we want to watch, we want to watch the racing over celebrating.

We want to watch call down. rooms over looking outside the podium and looking at Zach Brown walking down the pit lane. Like these are all old processes and very polished and all it's such a product. But they kind of forget sometimes what we want to watch. Like I've seen the onboard of Hamilton in those last lap or two. He's turned off corner cutting rules on the F1 game and just literally just cornercut everything. I want to watch that. Yeah.

The brother has lost his breaks. Fernando is catching him. I think Lewis on the first. An ultimate lap did a two minute eight. Like it was so obvious that Fernando was going to catch him. It was four tense at the end. Fernando said the F-bomb about seven times over the team radio saying he couldn't effing believe it with how Lewis had been driving.

And we don't get to see any of it. And what's going to happen? A replay. Yeah. And what's going to happen is they'll share that on TikTok or whatever and it will get more views than anything else than the race. And they'll go, look, it shows that people want to consume their content this way. It's no, that's what we want to freaking see during the race.

and we're watching it now because you're not showing it during the actual race. You know, if Formula One really, you know, there's talk about how like Formula One labels the drama more than anything else. Well, that was an opportunity to watch Fernando Alonzo basically losing his mind over the radio. Hamilton with no breaks. What's more dramatic than that? But no, we get to watch. and I get it. Like McLaren have won the Constructors

Championship and you need to pay, you know, give them credit for it and you can. But when the race finishes, it's the same conversation we have in qualifying when people haven't crossed the line yet and you're showing them in the garage clapping. It's just disrespectful. Like the race hasn't finished

and they just seem to forget that as soon as the winner crosses the line, that's it, the race is done and it's not. David, no one cares about anything else going on. Well, spoiler, we want to see all of the racing until every single person If anything, the most exciting bit of Formula One

is when you've got to battle going to the line because that's when it's the most exciting because it literally matters the most. You could even tell that Croftey was getting a little bit of grieved in the commentary. He's like, yeah, they're really close at the... Yeah, and he was even like,

we're seeing the wrong thing here and he obviously has to, you know, use more choice of words than we can of saying it's absolutely ridiculous. Turn it over! Show us Hamilton! But yeah, that was really disappointing. And we missed a lot of overtakes. And I feel like there's still better processes that need to happen here

because, yes, they focused on Lando versus Max, Max versus Lando. But like, how can we not switch between the two? How can we not have more mini boxes? I know that there's a separate product of F1 TV and maybe there's stuff there that stops certain things. But the amount of replays or like Olly Berman, I think, gained two positions and then done like a double overtake on one lap and didn't see any of it. Fernando Alonso went for an absolute dive bomb after the Anderson Bridge and made this

amazing move into the hairpin and we didn't see it. Yeah, it's that sort of stuff that just frustrates me because you sat there going, God, that was such a rubbish race and you go, actually there was quite a lot of awesome overtakes out there. And then Formula one shook out the social clips on a Tuesday and you find out there's been loads. Exactly. Right, let's head to a biggest winner, driver or team. I think it has to be George Russell, especially going into this weekend, unexpected to have such a performance.

So for me, easily has to be George Russell. Yeah, definitely. George Russell. Brilliant, brilliant drive. Biggest loser, driver or team as well. It was so nearly going to be Williams, but we'll get on to that one. Is it Ferrari being nowhere at a track

they should be good at and just being comfortable? Yeah, actually, I want to say that. and also add a little bit of spice to it. Ferrari biggest loser, sixth and seventh. Not only because of their result, the result on paper, I guess, is like, well, six and the seventh, but their cars are falling apart.

Yeah, Hamilton, of course, yeah, with the penalty. But their car is falling apart. Charles was over the radio saying he's having to lift and coast for 200 meters into the braking zone and stuff like that. And it just feels as though Ferrari have made a car that they don't fully understand, that they don't know how to unlock and the only way to unlock it is by basically scraping the plank into a non-existent zone and getting disqualified.

And I just feel for Charles, who was really quite slow out there at times when I was looking at the lap times. I was like, my God, Hamilton Pitt and obviously came through. But it's just, they're just nowhere. They're absolutely nowhere. For a team that, and the narrative about Ferrari as they always get maybe unfair, unfairly more criticized because they're Ferraris so they're expected they have a big expectation on them they have a lot of pressure I don't think they're getting enough stick for

basically almost winning the Constructors Championship last year to then building a car that can't even finish a race because they're having to manage so much that is absolutely unacceptable and yeah it's a you look at McLaren winning the championship by such a huge margin and they've done a fantastic job and congrats to them for winning the constructors but this was other you know every team had that that opportunity going to season think Ferrari you know

got Lewis Hamilton on board they've come so close to the Constructors Championship build on that and go into this year and could have easily been them and actually they're not only not even remotely challenging for the title they're now the fourth best cut Fun, fun, fun, fun for all Ferrari fans out there.

I don't know how you feel. Right, let's head to our predictions that we made on Wednesday to see how we did, the biggest championship of the mall. It's currently 45, 43 to Tommy. Boo! We go to our good surprise. I went for Fernando Alonzo, who I think was incredibly good surprising. and I thought at one point with his 9.2 second pit stop or whatever it was, that that was all in the bin, but he still managed to finish 8th and I think it was a very, very good performance.

What's crazy is that is a good surprise, but not in the way we expected. We expected Aston to just be good. And I think he's actually over-delivered with what he could do and had a slow pit stop because we thought Aston were going to be potentially comfortably the next best car, but I don't think that was the case at all. And after qualifying, when there was so much hype around Alonzo, didn't look like he'd potentially even score a point. So impressive from Fernando. His teammates, on the other hand, no, just not really anywhere. Who you went for. I went for, Lansdrol.

You went for Lansdra. Zero. Don't watch predictions. We now go to a big flop. Williams. Carlos Sites, I love you. No, no, no, no, no. Let's open this conversation for a second.

Hold the fort. You are going to rob me of a big flop because Carlos finished 10th after both the drivers got disqualified. They didn't get disqualified. They didn't qualify. They started last. Last to 10th challenge, Carlos Sites, brilliant drive.

Definitely not. No, no, no, no. It's a flop because they got disqualified from qualified. No chance. And it's called one point. Are you joking? Williams got a point. One point.

Yeah, this is arguably like their worst circuit and they got a point. No, no, no, no, no. relax yourself, right? This is a hundred percent going to the comments. You can't get a two-pointer. We're sending it to the comments. For a driver getting a point as a fraud. By the

regulations, I am taking this to the comments. People will, people can say their opinion of whether Williams both being disqualified and qualifying and then car scoring one singular point. So please let us know how you feel about this one. I know Tommy feels very strongly about this. But look, that's fine. This is why we have listeners.

So get involved. Get in touch. And we'll see what the thoughts are. Maxisthappen, biggest flop, that's the point for me because he won the last two races in a second. I love how he've actually written a point as well next to your name. You are fuming right now, but remember, Tommy doesn't care about who wins this championship. Let's go to a pole position where I went for Lando Norris,

which was incorrect. I went for Oscar Piastri, incorrect. In third position, I went for Oscar. And I went for George Russell, I didn't forget about him, but I didn't hype him up enough. Put him too low, yeah. In second place, I went for Lando Norris. I went for Oscar Pia Stappen.

And then in first place, I went for Max Verstappen. So in fact, I got first, second and third, as second, third, fourth. So I just forgot George Russell, otherwise I would have scored three points. George, why didn't you DNF, for God's sake? And I went for Lando Norris. Okay. So zero points on the top three.

That's crazy. That's crazy behavior from us. We are, we promise we know about the one. finished. Let's go to our crazy prediction. So mine, which I thought at one point might have come in, zero yellow flags, which, I mean, why didn't I just go for no safety car? Like, why did I just decide? I don't get any extra points for going to something even ridiculous. That's one ridiculous prediction of what I just went for, not even crazy. I'm gutted, I'm kicking myself and if I lose by one point, I'll know exactly where I lost it.

Mine was the first non-McClaren is over 30 seconds off the lead. I really, really went on this McLaren hype train, the championship's over for Max. But, well, third. And there was one McLaren on the podium in third position. Now, our Patreon prediction, this is where you can get involved, join the P1 Patreon. Mine was Jensen's listening with Incredible Hulk returns to the points.

qualifies 11th, he's fighting for a point, then he gets his front wing ripped off, and then spins off. So not only did Hulk, I know there had been another yellow flag, by the way, there had been another yellow flag, which I was going to question

as whether it was a graphical glitch about lap 14. But Hulk then decided, I'm going to remove myself from the equation of points and produce a yellow flag. So thank you so much, Nico, for costing me two points,

potentially. Yeah, yeah, I think you can have your Williams prediction and I'll give you minus two for that one. minus two you're getting minus 100 then for Baku

my prediction was the Lewis Hamilton gets his first podium in honour of Rosco by Jack which did not happen did not

did not happen at all sadly okay family top three the constructors championship that not as many people care about

but still before we before we do that so you potentially either got one point or three question mark and then what did you get

no stop saying no let the list of I got none I got none the whole the whole thing none yeah yeah oh that graphic on social is gonna pop off you just have crying faces on every single slide zero points

then you had a zero point for a while that's terrible no no you absolutely haven't but me scoring three will be great thanks thanks everybody right now we head to a family top three it's currently eight seven to the boring Bellingham's

Now, this is going to be interesting. So my dad, in third position, went for Lando Norris. Go on, Dad. Love that from you. Nice little point. My wife went for Oscar Piastri in P3. Second place. My dad went for Oscar Piastri.

Not incorrect. Katie went for Max Verstappen, which is correct. She seals the fact that... She's got more points than I did from the top three. And in first position, my dad went for Max Verstappen. Stappan. He said there was no stopping him and George Russell stopped him. And my wife went for Landon-Horris, which was of course incorrect. So it's the same as before. It's the same. Nine-eight. Nine-eight to the Bellingham's. I've, hath the Gallagher's ever led? I don't think

we have the entire season. But it doesn't matter as long as the last race, I'll be fielding my strongest team, which will not be my sister. I can promise you that. She's had one appearance. And that was, that was great. Right. That is it. We have reflected on a lot of things. Big shout-out actually as well to Ollie Berman. Great drive from him. P-9, got absolutely everything he could out of that has to score a couple of points, especially when he is carrying the weight of potentially

getting banned if he crashes into anybody or does anything silly. So well-on to Olly Berman, a good couple of points. Tommy, what are your final thoughts? My final thoughts are why do I have to wait like a couple of weeks for the next race? Because, yeah,

hype for Austin. A sprint as well. so we get straight into the the action on Friday, which we love to see. So bring it on. Hell, yeah. Podcasts coming out of our ears. That's in a couple of weeks. Look forward to that. Thank you, everybody, for the love and the support.

Remember to get your P1 Live Delusion Tour tickets, especially for America and Canada, because that's in less than a month's time. And we will see you very soon. Lots of love. Bye. Bye. P1 is a Stack production and part of the A-Cast's creator network.