2011 Singapore Grand Prix

Championship standings

Vettel leads comfortably. After Italy, Alonso moved up to second, with Button and Webber tied on points in third and fourth, and Hamilton fifth.

Previous race

Vettel won the Italian Grand Prix from pole. Alonso led into the first corner and Vettel took the lead from him one lap after the restart. Webber attempted to pass Massa, the two made contact and Webber continued with a broken front wing before crashing at Parabolica. Button finished second, Alonso third. Hamilton finished fourth but fell further back in the championship.

Between-race developments

Vitantonio Liuzzi receives a five-place grid penalty for causing an accident on the first lap of the Italian Grand Prix.

HRT added a tribute to Christian Bakkerud on their cars. Bakkerud, who raced in the 24 Hours of Le Mans twice for a team run by HRT principal Colin Kolles, died in a road accident on 11 September.

The Singapore Grand Prix is a night race, starting at 10pm local time; the curfew period therefore falls during daylight hours rather than the early morning as at European rounds. Toro Rosso team principal Franz Tost inadvertently arrived at the circuit before the curfew had expired, using up one of the team’s four permitted curfew waivers for the season. Red Bull, Mercedes and Virgin made the same mistake on Saturday morning; all three later had their waivers restored after demonstrating that the staff members who broke the curfew were not working on the cars.

Red Bull Racing faced accusations of having violated the Resource Restriction Agreement — the FOTA cost-limiting agreement — in 2010. An audit from a Dutch consultancy firm reportedly found that Red Bull had exceeded their agreed limits while McLaren, Ferrari, Mercedes and Sauber had passed the same inspection. Red Bull denied the accusations.

Milestones

This is the 50th Grand Prix start for Sébastien Buemi — he debuted at the 2009 Australian Grand Prix — and Sebastian Vettel’s 50th race for Red Bull Racing.

Tyre choices

Pirelli brings the yellow-banded soft as the prime and the red-banded super-soft as the option.

Practice

FP1 was delayed 30 minutes while kerbing dislodged by support race competitors on Republic Boulevard and Esplanade Drive was removed and the circuit declared safe. When the session opened it was shortened to one hour rather than the scheduled 90 minutes. Hamilton finished fastest, four hundredths ahead of Vettel, who was a second clear of Webber. Webber had an earlier on-track encounter with Glock that destroyed his front wing and ended Glock’s session with a puncture. Kovalainen’s Lotus caught fire in almost exactly the same location where his car caught alight in the 2010 Singapore Grand Prix; the session was red-flagged while the car was retrieved. When it restarted, Massa dislodged a kerb bolt, exposing a protruding bolt, forcing a second red flag; three minutes of running remained when the session was finally restarted.

FP2 began after kerbing at Turn 13 was removed overnight. Button stopped just short of the wall at Turn 14 after locking his brakes — the car could not be restarted, though his session time was fast enough to place him tenth overall. Buemi hit the barriers at Turn 21 and damaged his suspension. Alguersuari’s session was also cut short by a mechanical problem. Di Resta was limited to eight laps with hydraulic brake issues. Petrov was scheduled to run upgraded Renault bodywork but the car overheated, forcing the team to abandon the new parts until Suzuka. Vettel set the quickest time, two-tenths ahead of Alonso.

Overnight, kerbs at Turns 3 and 7 were replaced with painted markings, the Turn 14 kerb was removed, and repairs were carried out to the Turn 13 and “Singapore Sling” chicane kerbing.