Winners and losers from the 2025 Singapore Grand Prix

It was a pole-to-checkers victory for George Russell at the Singapore Grand Prix, but further down the field, we saw drama in the McLaren camp as the F1 2025 title fight gets ever closer to its conclusion.

Let’s take a look at the biggest winners and losers from the 2025 Singapore Grand Prix.

Winners and losers from the 2025 Singapore Grand Prix

Winner: George Russell

It feels like we heard George Russell’s name twice during the 2025 Singapore Grand Prix: Once at the start when the polesitter pulled away from Max Verstappen, and once as he brought his Mercedes home to the victory after 62 ultra-hot laps.

In many ways, that’s been the story of Russell’s F1 2025 season: A quiet and somewhat unremarkable dash for the maximum points he’s capable of achieving in any given race. This weekend, that turned out to be the 25 points of victory.

While Mercedes has definitely improved following the retraction of a fumbled upgrade earlier this year, Russell also credited his maturity as a driver for his success, citing 2023’s last-lap crash in Turn 10 as being representative of a more desperate, unsure competitor.

And for Russell, this victory is proof that he’s capable of contending for a title in the future.

Loser: McLaren

Yes, McLaren secured yet another World Constructors’ Championship crown with six races still remaining in the F1 2025 season. But the team now finds itself in yet another awkward position as its “papaya rules” mandate faces another challenge.

“Papaya rules” represents the team’s desire to treat both of its drivers as equal competitors in the championship fight; the only requirement is that those drivers race one another with respect and without contact. The goal, then, is to prevent any undue interference from the team and to avoid choosing favorites.

But there comes a time when that attempts to avoid undue interference may seem like the team is choosing sides, and that seems to be the case in Singapore now that the drivers’ championship battle between Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri is hotting up.

Norris made a bold move into the first turn that saw him bounce off Max Verstappen and, as a result, bounce into Piastri. The move almost landed Piastri in the wall, and the driver was clear in expressing his frustration on the radio by pointing out Norris’ behavior was not very “team-like.” McLaren declined to assign any blame or make any calls during the race itself.

The concern in this instance is that McLaren has previously stepped in to right perceived wrongs that have transpired during the race, be it asking Norris to cede position to Piastri at the 2024 Hungarian Grand Prix or asking Piastri to cede position to Norris at the 2025 Italian Grand Prix. By declining to intervene in this instance, it’s entirely possible that Piastri has perceived the team nevertheless made a choice — and it chose not to address the contact on track.

While it’s entirely likely that cooler heads will prevail in post-race discussions, McLaren nevertheless finds itself torn between two drivers who are both desperate to win their first title.

Winner: Lando Norris

While McLaren overall was a loser this weekend, Lando Norris did indeed emerge largely unscathed: He finished two positions higher than he started, carved three points out of the championship deficit to his teammate, gave his team a WCC-securing podium, and was given the choice to once again decide both his own strategy and that of his teammate Oscar Piastri — all during a weekend where Norris complained that it was “the driver” at fault for the slow pace of the No. 4 machine, not the car itself.

It was not a masterclass drive; Norris’ dive into Turn 1 was somewhat desperate, and while he told media that he never intended to collide with his teammate, well — any driver would have gone for the gap that had opened up before him.

More than anything, this weekend is an affirmation for Norris that his approach to this tense title battle is still worth clinging to, because it’s paying off.

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Loser: Oscar Piastri

And yes, if Norris is a winner, then Oscar Piastri was a loser this weekend at the Singapore Grand Prix.

Pundits tend to praise Piastri’s cool head, but the Australian driver’s ability to funnel his frustration into acquiescence has once again gotten him in trouble — in the sense that he’s giving conceding too much to his team.

Whether or not Norris intended to clobber Piastri into Turn 1 likely feels like it’s completely beside the point for the Australian; the simple fact is that he was clobbered and lost a position. And to add insult to injury, he was on the receiving end of one of the team’s slow pit stops, which squandered his chances at transforming his late-race pace into a battle for the podium.

But what really cements Piastri’s place in the ‘loser’ category is his willingness to toe the party line. When the team makes a request of Piastri, he may not agree with it, but he listens. At this stage in the championship, that cannot be his defining mindset. Norris has displayed a willingness to play fast and loose with McLaren’s papaya rules; Piastri must be willing to do the same.

Winner: Max Verstappen

Max Verstappen’s victory streak has come to an abrupt end here in Singapore, but by finishing second in an RB21 that transformed into the ill-handling beast it had been earlier this season, the Dutch driver has certainly proved that Red Bull’s late-season pace is no fluke.

Can that pace enable Verstappen to challenge for his fifth consecutive drivers’ championship? That’s still not completely clear; the team has admitted that it anticipated Singapore would be difficult, and in the race, Verstappen definitely struggled; it’s highly likely that the dirty air rocketing off the rear of his car is what largely kept Lando Norris in his rearview mirror.

At other tracks, Norris may have been able to pass. But it’s also just as likely that at other tracks, Verstappen wouldn’t have had such a challenging day.

All Verstappen really needed to do was keep his name in the conversation, and he did that in spades.

Loser: Lewis Hamilton

As if losing his brakes at the end of the Singapore Grand Prix wasn’t bad enough, Lewis Hamilton was slapped with a five-second penalty after the race that dropped him from seventh to eighth in the classification. The reason? He exceeded track limits several times on laps 60 and 61.

“We’ve finished P9 because we got five five-second penalty for track limits,” race engineer Riccardo Adami told Hamilton.

“Surely it’s not a penalty when it’s force majeure?” Hamilton replied.

Ultimately, the stewards did not accept the ‘force majeure’ argument — meaning that they decided a loss of brake pressure was no excuse for track limits violations.

There is some consolation in the fact that Hamilton’s penalty only saw him lose one position and not two, but that’s still quite the bitter pill to swallow.

Winner: Carlos Sainz

He largely went unnoticed for most of the Singapore Grand Prix, but Carlos Sainz should absolutely be one of the event’s winners.

Both Williams drivers were disqualified from qualifying after stewards deemed them to be using an illegal wing, and as a result, both cars were sent to the very back of the field. Sainz saw a slight promotion to 18th on the starting grid when two other cars opted for pit-lane starts — and somehow, at this track where passing was a challenge, he finished 10th, within the points.

The secret was a pit stop at the end of the race for soft tyres, which enabled Sainz to overtake a slew of the cars in front of him. It wasn’t the perfect result, but it was a legitimately impressive rebound after the team seemed doomed to circulate at the rear of the field.

Read next: Singapore GP: Russell dominates as McLaren title rivalry finally kicks off