Max Verstappen benefitted from a last lap crash for George Russell at the Singapore Grand Prix on Sunday, with the Dutchman having been well behind the Mercedes driver all race.
Russell had been fighting for the victory at the Marina Bay Circuit, before he crashed at Turn 10 whilst trying to put Lando Norris under pressure for second place.
The 25-year-old clipped the wall on the entry into the corner, something which sent him straight off into the wall.
Lewis Hamilton inherited P3 following Russell’s crash, whilst Verstappen was promoted from sixth to fifth.
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Verstappen was quick to ask his team after the race about how Russell went into the wall, to which team principal Christian Horner informed him that the British driver did it all “on his own”.
“So by whom did he go into the barrier?” Verstappen asked over the team radio.
Horner replied: “On his own,” to which Verstappen responded: “Oh… ok.”
The Dutchman was well behind the fight for the podium after starting from P11, after he endured his second worst qualifying of the season.
Verstappen just didn’t have the pace for Q3, neither did team-mate Sergio Perez who could only manage 13th on Saturday.
Red Bull struggled for outright pace throughout the weekend, making Verstappen’s recovery to fifth very respectable.
Had the race been a lap longer, then fifth would’ve been fourth for the championship leader, who was catching Charles Leclerc with ease in the closing laps.
A Safety Car and a VSC ultimately ruined Verstappen’s chances of fighting for a rostrum, with Red Bull having attempted to run both cars deep into the race.
The Safety Car in particular ruined Verstappen’s strategy as it meant the majority of the drivers could complete a cheap pit-stop, something which worked against Red Bull.
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He admitted after the race that the Milton Keynes-based outfit experienced “some bad luck” during the race, but that he was “quite quick” at the end.
“We had some bad luck with the Safety Cars as well,” Verstappen told Sky Sports F1.
“The first one was at the wrong point and also the second one came at the wrong point for us. So [it was] a bit of a shame. I had fun in the second stint. We were quite quick on the medium compound.”