Ferrari’s Singapore GP strategy left Lewis Hamilton exposed to a severe late-race tyre decline and ultimately cost him a realistic opportunity to fight for the podium. Although the seven-time world champion played a part in the decisive sequence under the Virtual Safety Car, the way Ferrari managed the remainder of his race raises an equally important question about whether more could have been done from the pit wall.
Max Verstappen’s victory for Red Bull showed why a one-stop race had been considered the preferred approach at Marina Bay. However, the outcome also demonstrated that simply choosing the theoretically fastest strategy was not enough. Drivers still had to make the C4 Medium and C5 Soft compounds last while retaining competitive pace, and Hamilton became the clearest example of how quickly that plan could unravel.
Singapore GP strategy favoured the one-stop approach
The overall strategy picture was relatively straightforward. Verstappen completed the race with a C5 Soft-C4 Medium sequence after extending his opening stint to 32 laps. Lando Norris also made the same strategy work for McLaren, as did Liam Lawson for Racing Bulls, with both producing particularly strong results relative to expectations.
Oliver Bearman and Esteban Ocon for Haas, Carlos Sainz for Williams and Fernando Alonso for Aston Martin also used the Soft-Medium combination, although they finished outside the points. That meant seven drivers followed this sequence.
Another seven effectively used the reverse strategy, starting on C4 Mediums before moving onto C5 Softs. Hamilton was the highest finisher from this group in sixth place. Nico Hulkenberg for Audi, George Russell for Mercedes and Isack Hadjar for Red Bull also scored points with that approach, while Pierre Gasly, Arvid Lindblad and Valtteri Bottas completed the group.
The strategic picture underlined how important tyre behaviour became throughout the weekend, something also visible in the broader Ferrari Singapore GP telemetry analysis.
A third group benefited significantly from the Virtual Safety Car triggered on lap 39 by Lance Stroll’s retirement. Charles Leclerc, Kimi Antonelli, Oscar Piastri and Sergio Perez all completed a two-stop Soft-Medium-Soft race. They had made their first stops after roughly 20 laps, but the Medium compound was not delivering the competitiveness they had hoped for.
The VSC therefore arrived at an ideal moment. All four could switch back to Soft tyres for the final stint, giving them a substantial performance advantage over drivers who remained on older rubber.
There were also four retirements from the race: Alex Albon for Williams, Stroll for Aston Martin, Franco Colapinto for Alpine and Gabriel Bortoleto for Audi.
Why Ferrari’s split strategy was not the original problem
The difficulties Hamilton experienced cannot simply be traced back to Ferrari choosing different starting compounds for its two cars. The C3 Hard tyre, identified by its white sidewall in Singapore, had effectively been rejected across the field after Friday’s FP1 running indicated that it was an unattractive race option.
That left teams primarily considering either a Medium-Soft or Soft-Medium one-stop race. With the two approaches proving broadly comparable in overall race time, Ferrari had a reasonable basis for splitting its cars and giving Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton different strategic possibilities.
The first problem instead emerged from the way Hamilton’s opening stint developed. Starting on Mediums should theoretically have allowed the Briton to remain on track considerably longer than Leclerc, who had begun the race on Softs.
That did not happen. Leclerc was able to stay close to Verstappen’s lap times for much of his opening stint, while Hamilton struggled to produce comparable performance from the Mediums. He therefore stopped on lap 18 and moved onto Softs.
The timing immediately created a difficult equation. Reaching the finish would require Hamilton to complete another 44 laps on the C5 compound, an extremely long second stint even considering how well the Soft had been performing in Singapore.
Lewis Hamilton’s Singapore GP strategy turns on lap 39
The decisive moment arrived when the Virtual Safety Car was deployed on lap 39. At that stage, Hamilton was 2.7 seconds behind Leclerc and 8.6 seconds behind race leader Verstappen.
Ferrari prepared to bring both cars into the pits. Leclerc stopped, while Hamilton remained on the circuit. The precise nature of that decision was not completely clear in the immediate analysis of the incident, with the sequence leaving room for debate over whether remaining out was primarily an error or a conscious tactical choice.
One possible strategic logic was clear. Had Hamilton stopped immediately, he would have remained behind Leclerc. By continuing, however, he retained a possibility of gaining track position if the VSC became a full Safety Car and compressed the field, something that frequently happens on street circuits.
That gamble did not pay off. Stroll’s car was in a relatively favourable recovery position, the marshals dealt with the incident quickly and the VSC lasted barely a lap. The crucial lap-39 sequence became the defining moment of Hamilton’s afternoon, with the wider circumstances surrounding the Singapore GP VSC decision central to understanding how his podium opportunity disappeared.
Ferrari had another opportunity to rescue Hamilton’s race
Once the VSC ended, stopping Hamilton immediately would have cost him the podium positions because Leclerc and Antonelli had already taken advantage of the neutralisation to change tyres. The problem was that staying out only postponed the strategic consequences.
Leclerc needed six laps to erase the 13-second gap to his team-mate and overtake him. By lap 46, the threat posed by Hamilton’s ageing Soft tyres was becoming increasingly obvious.
This was the point at which the strategic criticism shifts towards Ferrari. A second stop around lap 46 was calculated to leave Hamilton in approximately fifth place with a fresh set of Soft tyres and another 15 or 16 laps remaining.
That would at least have given him the opportunity to attack Norris, who was running on Mediums. Even if fourth place had remained out of reach, fifth was a realistic alternative to asking Hamilton to take an increasingly worn set of Softs all the way to the finish.
Instead, Ferrari kept the number 44 on track. Hamilton was left trying to protect his position as tyre performance deteriorated, turning what had been a potential podium fight into a late defensive battle. The contrasting trajectories of the Ferrari drivers also provide important context for the discussion over Hamilton and Leclerc’s competing Singapore strategies.
Hamilton’s mistake did not remove Ferrari’s responsibility
Hamilton can reasonably carry responsibility for his role in the lap-39 decision. However, almost half of the Grand Prix still remained at that stage, and Ferrari still had opportunities to reconsider the strategy as the second stint developed.
The seven-time world champion had made several important strategic calls successfully during the season, while Singapore represented one of the occasions when his judgement did not produce the desired result. From that perspective, his initial mistake did not necessarily justify allowing the race to continue without a more aggressive attempt to limit the damage.
Leclerc, meanwhile, was able to use his fresh Soft tyres to move clear once he had passed his team-mate and continue his own fight near the front. His race against Verstappen featured other decisive moments as well, including the missed battery opportunity in Leclerc’s battle with Verstappen.
For Hamilton, the result was sixth place. The larger strategic lesson for Ferrari is that making the correct initial call is only one part of race management. Once circumstances change, particularly during a VSC or Safety Car window, the team must also recognise when the original plan is no longer the most competitive route to the finish.
Pirelli explains why the Hard tyre was ignored
Dario Marrafuschi, Pirelli motorsport director, explained after the race that the one-stop strategy had worked in line with expectations. He indicated that the C5 Soft had played the central role because it was capable of completing very long stints while maintaining a strong level of performance, although drivers who used it for roughly half of the race began to experience a performance drop in the closing stages.
Marrafuschi also confirmed that the Hard compound had offered little strategic appeal. According to the Pirelli motorsport director, its lack of grip made it unattractive, while the softer C4 showed virtually no degradation without offering enough of an additional strategic advantage to alter a race already centred on one-stop strategies.
He added that tyre degradation broadly matched what Pirelli had observed during practice. Overall wear remained manageable, although the right-rear tyre required particular attention. That assessment helps explain both why the field avoided the Hard and why Hamilton’s exceptionally long Soft stint became increasingly vulnerable towards the chequered flag.
More analysis of the SF-26’s behaviour, tyre usage and race performance is available in the Ferrari technical analysis section.
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