Why the Singapore Sprint weekend poses such a challenge for F1 drivers

Like any street race venue, Singapore has always been a big test for Formula 1 drivers as they build up their speed and confidence over the weekend in the run-up to Qualifying.

And as a night race, there is always the extra challenge of not just the normal ramping up of grip that you get on any street track, but also the change in conditions associated with the move from daylight to darkness sessions.

Throw in the heat and punishing night race schedule, with its early morning finishes for drivers and team members, and Singapore is one of the toughest events on the schedule.

This year the Sprint format has added a further dimension. Everyone has just the Friday FP1 session with which to get their eye in before plunging into Sprint Qualifying – thus they will have to get up to limit a lot earlier than they usually do at a street venue, which inevitably creates some risk.

Add in the fact that the single practice session will be held in the daytime, Sprint Qualifying that follows is at night, and then the Sprint itself is set to take place in sunshine, and it won’t be easy for anyone to hit the set-up sweet spot that is ideal for all circumstances.

“It’s going to be very interesting,” says World Championship leader Kimi Antonelli. “First of all, a Sprint weekend in a city circuit is always very challenging, because the track just evolves so quickly that it's going to be so different from session to session.

“Also, FP1 tomorrow is going to be in the day, and Quali is going to be in the night. So it's going to be very, very different. But it's a good challenge for us drivers, for the team.”

Coping with changing grip conditions will be the key, and Max Verstappen believes it is important to start from a good baseline in practice.

“As every year here, you know that during the day you have a little bit less grip,” says the Sepang winner. “It's probably a little bit harder on the tyres. But the most important thing is just to find a good balance with the car straight away in FP1. That will probably just help a lot for the rest of your weekend.

“It's always hectic, a Sprint weekend, to make the right choices. And sometimes you just have a better one, or you have a bit more of a more straightforward one than others. But at the moment, it's very difficult to know how it's going to go.

“But yeah, naturally, when you drive during the day at a Sprint compared to in the night, it will have different challenges. But at the same time, we also know that this track is very hard to pass.

“So I think at the end of the day, the most important thing is qualifying for Sprint, or the race, because that normally defines where you finish.”

Just as some drivers take more time to get up to speed, some teams have a better record of arriving with a car suited to a given track. Lewis Hamilton is confident that Ferrari fall into that category and can thus count on being strong from FP1 onwards.

“I honestly think we generally hit the ground often running pretty well, more often than not, in FP1,” says the seven-time World Champion. “And then from session to session, some people close up, some people pull away. But I think our simulation team did a really great job, and more often than not, the car started in a not a terrible place throughout the year.

“So I'm hoping that we start from the right place, and it's exciting to come here, to come to Singapore, and you only have one session. Everyone's in the same boat, so it could be good, could be not good. But we'll see how it goes tomorrow.”

Alex Albon echoes the theme of starting with a solid set-up, and he makes an interesting observation about the day/night changes.

“It’s not so much the temperature, but it's what the sun does to the tyres as it comes out and goes down,” says the Williams driver. “So what you'll see normally in FP1 and FP3, the tyres are quite easy to get up to temperature and get them to work. And as soon as the sun drops, the tyres take on a completely different response. But we're used to that because that's been here every year.

“In terms of set-up changes, you kind of go into this weekend with a little bit more of a baseline, something that kind of we know will work, something that that fits most tracks.

“Most probably, you go on the side of confidence, whether that's through ride, suspension, just general set-up being a little bit more understeer, and then you kind of try to build the weekend a little bit differently like that.”

The schedule is the same for everyone, but it will be an especially tough test for Arvid Lindblad as the only rookie in the field.

The Briton has had to learn other tracks on Sprint weekends already this season, but he agrees that Singapore will be particularly tricky.

“It's just a normal tendency of the night races that you do have some sessions a little bit more in the daylight,” says the Racing Bulls driver. “So you don't have that similarity across the five sessions, let's say. Yes, that's an added challenge.

“I would say that maybe I can relate a bit more to F2. I'd have to have a look to the last year to have a look at how much the lap times improved.

"It was very often in F2 when we’d do a practice during the day on the hard [tyre], and then you’d go to Qualifying at night on the soft, and you go like five seconds quicker.

“I don't think it'll be that much here, but I've had it where you go back out and you have a load more grip, and you have to just get on it.”

That building up of confidence on a wall-lined track will be harder for Lindblad than anyone else, given that thus far he has only seen it in the simulator.

“You still can build up, but it's obviously a very different way you have to do that,” he says. “I experienced that in Canada. I really tried to make an effort in the first run to just build up the confidence and get comfortable, and then you start to push on towards the last laps of FP1, and then more in Sprint Quali.

“It's true that it's not easy because on street circuits, it is all about building up. In the end, all that matters is that you go into Qualifying confident and comfortable.

“And I didn't do the best job of that in the previous two street circuits; I crashed twice in FP2. But obviously I can learn from that, and it was a valuable lesson. But it's even harder now on a Sprint weekend, because you have even fewer sessions. So it's something I'm thinking about – how to get that balance right.”