Max Verstappen maintained his strong form to claim pole position for Saturday's Sprint at the Singapore Grand Prix, and kept it after avoiding a penalty in an investigation over yellow flags. Fresh from winning Red Bull's first race of the season from their first pole last week in Malaysia, Verstappen needed just a single flying lap at the end of SQ3 to take pole by just over a tenth of a second from Mercedes' George Russell.
Championship leader Kimi Antonelli was only seventh in the other Mercedes, which features the problematic upgrade introduced last week in Malaysia. Russell, who will serve a grid penalty in Sunday's main Grand Prix, is running the older specification car and qualified half a second ahead of Antonelli in the newer one.
Verstappen's pole was in doubt for more than two hours after qualifying, when he was investigated for passing Lewis Hamilton's Ferrari in SQ1 under yellow flags. The flags had been waved for debris on the track after Cadillac's Sergio Perez hit the barriers. After speaking to both drivers and analysing telemetry and in-car footage, stewards ruled that Verstappen had breached the yellow-flag rules, but were satisfied that the overtake was an unfortunate consequence of the significant closing speed differential. No penalty was applied.
Ferrari had looked the team to beat heading into SQ3, and Charles Leclerc held provisional pole after his first lap, but he was shuffled back to third. Hamilton, also a pole contender, finished sixth behind the McLaren duo of Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris, in fourth and fifth respectively. Liam Lawson was eighth for Racing Bulls, ahead of Isack Hadjar, whose SQ3 lap time was deleted, and Pierre Gasly was 10th for Alpine.
Source: Sky Sports Champions League · Summarized by HeadlinesBriefing