Martin Brundle believes Lewis Hamilton attempted to take on too much responsibility from inside the Ferrari cockpit during the Singapore Grand Prix, arguing that modern Formula 1 makes it extremely difficult for a driver to manage both the car and the wider race strategy at the same time.
The Briton’s race unravelled after he chose to stay out under a Virtual Safety Car with just over 20 laps remaining. The seven-time world champion had been in contention for third place before the decision, but eventually fell to sixth as Charles Leclerc, Kimi Antonelli and both McLaren drivers moved ahead on fresher tyres.
Martin Brundle questions Lewis Hamilton’s Singapore strategy role
Lewis Hamilton did not complete his usual post-race media duties because he was feeling unwell, but he had already accepted responsibility over the team radio. Ferrari team principal Fred Vasseur later confirmed that Hamilton had been called in to double-stack behind Charles Leclerc, meaning the option to stop was available.
The decisive sequence has already become one of the major talking points from Ferrari’s weekend, particularly because Hamilton’s decision to stay out ultimately cost him valuable track position as his tyres deteriorated.
Toto Wolff also observed that Hamilton was effectively unable to defend himself against drivers running on significantly fresher tyres. The Ferrari driver had fitted his Soft compound on lap 18, leaving him with an extremely long final stint once he committed to staying out under the later VSC.
Martin Brundle viewed the episode as a revealing example of the limits facing a driver in modern Formula 1. His assessment was that Hamilton had effectively tried to manage both the demands of driving the car and Ferrari’s strategic picture from behind the wheel, something the former Formula 1 driver regarded as exceptionally difficult.
Ferrari had expected Lewis Hamilton to pit under the VSC
According to Martin Brundle, the one-stop approach that required Lewis Hamilton to complete 44 laps on the same set of tyres was ultimately the driver’s own decision. Hamilton subsequently apologised to Ferrari and accepted that the choice had not produced the intended result.
Brundle’s wider point was that a modern Formula 1 driver does not have access to the same complete strategic picture as the pit wall. Ferrari appeared to expect Hamilton to stop under the Virtual Safety Car, yet the Briton remained on track and committed himself to defending position with heavily used tyres.
That distinction has also formed part of the wider debate about Ferrari’s communication during the race. Jolyon Palmer and Karun Chandhok have both defended Hamilton by pointing out that he could not see all the information available to the team from inside the cockpit.
The precise exchange between Lewis Hamilton and race engineer Carlo Santi remains unclear because a technical problem prevented the relevant radio messages from being included on the public feed. That missing communication has made it harder to establish exactly how strongly Ferrari instructed its driver to stop and how the strategic consequences were presented to him.
Questions over that communication have also been raised in analysis of Carlo Santi’s message before Hamilton’s costly Marina Bay decision.
Medium tyre choice put Lewis Hamilton on the back foot
The problem had begun much earlier than the VSC. Lewis Hamilton started the Singapore Grand Prix on Medium tyres, a compound choice that ultimately proved unsuccessful. Ferrari entered the race with limited information after having only one conventional practice session and then a wet Sprint, leaving the team without the usual quantity of dry-running data.
The alternative strategic approach was likely a mutual decision between Hamilton and Ferrari, but the Mediums performed so poorly that the seven-time world champion had to abandon them much earlier than anticipated. That early stop forced him onto the Soft compound on lap 18 and immediately complicated the remainder of his race.
Once Hamilton had committed to the Softs, every later strategic choice became more difficult. Staying out during the VSC offered track position, but it also required asking the tyres to survive a very long stint against rivals who had been able to stop under reduced-speed conditions.
The broader tyre and race-management problems that shaped both Ferrari cars are examined further in the Ferrari SF-26 Singapore GP analysis, which looks at the rear-grip issues and strategic decisions that influenced the team’s weekend.
Lewis Hamilton explains why he took the Singapore gamble
Lewis Hamilton later addressed the failed strategy in a social-media post. He explained that making progress through overtaking had been extremely difficult at Marina Bay, so he felt it was necessary to attempt something different rather than simply accept the existing race order.
The Briton acknowledged that the strategy did not produce the result he had wanted and took responsibility for his own decisions. He regarded the outcome as a painful lesson but stressed that Formula 1 inevitably involves calls that do not always succeed and that the important part is accepting mistakes and moving forward from them.
That response reinforced his earlier apology over the radio and left no doubt about his willingness to own the failed gamble. The full context surrounding his reaction can also be found in the report on how Lewis Hamilton accepted responsibility after the Singapore strategy backfired.
Why Martin Brundle sees a wider modern F1 problem
Martin Brundle’s criticism was therefore not simply that Lewis Hamilton had made the wrong strategic decision. His argument centred on how difficult it is for any driver to process the complete tactical situation while simultaneously extracting performance from a modern Formula 1 car.
Ferrari’s pit wall had access to the gaps, tyre information and strategic alternatives across the field. Hamilton, by contrast, had to rely on information supplied over the radio while driving at racing speed and considering the immediate threat from cars behind him.
That does not remove responsibility from the seven-time world champion, who has already accepted the outcome as his own mistake. Instead, the episode highlights the tension between driver instinct and pit-wall strategy when circumstances change quickly during a race.
The consequences were particularly costly because Hamilton had been on course for a podium before the gamble. By the finish, Charles Leclerc, Kimi Antonelli and both McLaren drivers had passed him, leaving the Ferrari driver sixth and adding another race in which points were lost from his side of the garage.
Hamilton nevertheless remains third in the Drivers’ Championship, although Max Verstappen, Charles Leclerc and Lando Norris are now all within 30 points behind him. That makes the points lost in Singapore especially significant as the battle around the leading championship positions continues.
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