P3 on the starting grid, ahead of him only the two title contenders: poleman Lando Norris and defending champion Max Verstappen. Things did not look so bad for Lewis Hamilton ahead of the Singapore Grand Prix.
On race day, however, he was the only one – along with Daniel Ricciardo – to start on the softest compound while the rest of the grid went for Mediums.
A move that was supposed to give him a head start to catch the drivers ahead of him in the first laps, but that ended up ruining his race.
Even on the medium compound Norris’s McLaren had such a good pace that he managed to create some distance quite early on.
Being on Softs Hamilton was forced to go into the pits earlier than the rest of the pack, resulting in both his teammate George Russell and the McLaren of Oscar Piastri finishing ahead of him.
Ultimately, he closed the race in P6, splitting the Ferraris of Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz.
“I think we’ve read the race wrong,” Team Principal Toto Wolff told media after the Grand Prix.
“We took a decision based on historic Singapore races where it is basically a procession, Monaco-like, and that the soft tyre would give him an opportunity at the start,” he explained.
“That was pretty much the only overtaking opportunity. That was the wrong decision that we all took together jointly. It felt like a good offset but with the rear tyre degradation that we had it was just one way and that was backwards.”
A strategy that left Hamilton rather unpleased in what was his last race in the streets of Singapore with the team.
“So, there was a logic behind it, but obviously it was contrary to what we should’ve decided. But it doesn’t hide away from the fact that the car is too slow. Maybe the opposition are ahead or behind but that doesn’t change anything,” concluded Wolff.
