Max Verstappen started from eighth in the 2022 F1 Singapore GP race after aborting his final decisive qualifying lap on Saturday, and dropped a further four places when his anti-stall system tripped as the lights went out.
The Dutchman was making progress through the pack after the safety car restart, and just as he was going to overtake Lando Norris and his McLaren, he went wide and locked up the tyres, forcing him to make one more pit stop to finish seventh.
In recent seasons the Red Bull driver has rarely been in that kind of situation where he should pass a lot of slower cars, and he insisted it was not a pretty one.
“Zero,” he said when asked if he enjoyed date night on the streets of Marina Bay. “That’s not what I enjoy, I want to win or at least be fighting at the front.”
“This is just frustrating, being stuck behind the cars, having a problem at the start, and then having a big crash to get back to the back,” said the reigning world champion.
Verstappen assured that his disappointment was not mitigated by the fact that he still has more time to be crowned the title winner in 2022: “That is not the problem, we continue, I think 104 points ahead, but it is a very good weekend. frustrating, although I could have said it doesn’t matter.
“We have five races left, and we have a big lead, but I want to have a good grand prix every time, and this was a terrible one, which started with the big screw up in qualifying,” explained the Dutchman.
On top of that, he admitted that few things went right for him throughout the eventful Asian night: “At the start I got anti-stalled so I lost more positions, I have no idea why or how, I felt like I did all the normal [exit] procedure.”
“So you are in an even more difficult position to have a good result,” he said. “I managed to overtake a few cars but got stuck, it’s impossible to overtake here, and once I was in a decent spot I tried to overtake Lando [Norris] but I bottomed a bit when I hit the brakes.
“My wheels went off, and I had a big flat on them. I was already struggling more normally in the race, but there I had some bottoming under braking, I didn’t even brake late,” Verstappen said. “The tire pressures were maybe a little bit lower, but I hit the brakes and moved off the line, so the wheels went up and that’s why I locked up.”
“That’s why I had to go back to the pits, I put on new tires and I got back to the points, but it’s not what we wanted, we can’t ask for miracles either,” said the Dutchman before acknowledging that it would be special to win the world championship at Honda ‘s home in Japan. : “It would be nice, but first we are going to focus on doing a clean weekend.”
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