Andrew Benson
BBC F1 correspondent in Singapore

Image source, Getty Images

Red Bull's Max Verstappen took his second pole position in a week by beating the Ferraris of Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton in qualifying at the Singapore Grand Prix.

Verstappen's first lap in final qualifying was enough to take pole, his time fending off a second lap from Leclerc that was 0.054 seconds off pole.

Hamilton was closest to Verstappen after the first runs but was unable to improve on his second run.

In fact, most of the front runners struggled to improve on their second runs, as Mercedes' Kimi Antonelli took fourth on the grid, from McLaren's Lando Norris.

Antonelli's team-mate George Russell was sixth fastest but will drop to the back of the grid with a penalty for using too many engine parts.

McLaren's Oscar Piastri was the only driver in the top four teams other than Leclerc to improve on his second run but could do no better than qualify seventh.

Alpine's Pierre Gasly and the Racing Bulls of Liam Lawson and Arvid Lindblad completed the top 10.

Full report

That is all from us today. What a Saturday in Singapore!

Red Bull's Max Verstappen won the sprint race and took pole position for Sunday's race.

Lights out for the Singapore Grand Prix at 13:00 BST.

Join us from 12:00 as we build up to the race.

Enjoy the rest of your Saturday!

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Red Bull's Max Verstappen has won races at almost every track he has driven at. It was just the one he had left to conquer, before F1 added Madrid to the calendar this year.

The one that he hasn't quite managed in all these years? The Singapore Grand Prix.

It will be like an itch he needs to scratch. He's taken one step towards it already after cinching pole position.

He got pole in the sprint race and won the sprint. And now a pole for the race in Marina Bay. Can he complete the lot? He will hope so.

In the past three years, the drivers who got pole also won the race - George Russell in 2025, Lando Norris in 2024 and Carlos Sainz in 2023.

Alice Powell
British racing driver on BBC Radio 5 Sports Extra

It's clean sweep in terms of pole positions for Max Verstappen this weekend, in the sprint and now the grand prix. Can he make it a clean sweep in terms of wins as well? I'm sure the Ferraris are fast starters - Max even mentioned after his sprint win, Red Bull really need to nail these race starts, because he lost the lead in Malaysia last week, and he lost the lead earlier on today in the sprint.

That will be his next focus, I'm sure. Red Bull will be looking at how they execute it.

Lewis Hamilton certainly got a fast start in the sprint off the line.

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McLaren boss Andrea Stella has been speaking to Sky Sports about McLaren's day in Singapore, following that contact in the sprint race between team-mates Lando Norris Oscar Piastri.

"It's been a long day. The sprint was a race that was giving us some good points in a moment we were not in the position to win," said Stella. "But then we saw two McLarens making contact, basically going out of the race - Lando scored one point, but definitely that is not enough.

"Seeing two McLarens making contact, that is simply not acceptable. This is something that we will discuss with our drviers. We will do it in private. We will reiterate the interests are far bigger than any of us; there's no ego, there's no person that is bigger than the interests of the McLaren Formula 1 team.

"I'm sure, like always, this will be a conversation that will lead the team to being more united and even stronger."

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McLaren's Lando Norris speaking to Sky Sports after qualifying P5 for the Singapore Grand Prix: "Kind of hoping to do a magical lap and bring things together but it didn't seem to happen. The more I seemed to push at the end, the more slower we went. the car was too much to handle. We're way deserve to be and where we should be. But otherwise, not a lot more we could do.

On his collision with his teammate during the sprint: "As a team we all spoke about it. I apologised but that's all you need to know."

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Mercedes' team boss Toto Wolff speaking to Sky Sports after the drivers qualified P4 and P6: "Complicated because we had two different cars running. The mechanics did an unbelievable job in putting the car back together but maybe at the end we didn't have all of the sensors on the car and it didn't feel as good as it did before. So George did a really good job. On Kimi's side the updates seem to have worked now. Him and his engineers have dialled out the problems and we got closer and closer and eventually we're missing a tenth and a half or two tenths, which for qualifying is positive."

On the upgrades: "It will take some more proof of concept before I'm feeling more warm and fuzzy but we will have more detail after the race if we can have less degradation."

On Russell's sprint crash: "When I saw the yellow coming out I didn't think it was him because I didn't imagine George would make such a mistake because it hasn't happened for a long time. That was very, very unusual. Fair enough, the power kicked in when he didn't expect it on the white line. Running first is always tricky because you're looking how fast you can go in the corners. It can happen."

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Mercedes' George Russell, speaking to Sky Sports, on his qualifying session: "We were saving tyres but it was also a case to make sure the car was built back together correctly. There was something a bit odd because Kimi is in a similar position as yesterday but for me it didn't feel the same."

On his hopes for tomorrow's race starting from the back of the grid: "Having a great race, trying to come through, have good overtakes, points, but for sure it's going to be a tough race tomorrow."

Red Bull's Max Verstappen has overtaken Lando Norris for the fifth spot in the drivers' standings after the four-time world champion won the sprint in Singapore.

He sits just a point behind Ferrari's Charles Leclerc, in fourth.

A race win of 25 points could help him move up in the drivers' standings.

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Championship leader Kimi Antonelli, speaking to Sky Sports, after qualifying P4 in Singapore: "[The car] definitely felt in a better place today, even though the window is very small when the car operates. But especially throughout qualifying when you try to find more of time, the car always reacts a bit differently. This could also be from corner to corner.

"But I think the team did a really good job, as first of all we found the issues, and now we're able to understand the package more. And now it's about trying to find the right window with the set-up to make sure the package works at this spec.

"Tomorrow we will try and get a good start and let's see what we can do from P4. A podium would be very good, but let's also see how I will feel together with car on track. I'll do my best."

While I am on a stats roll.

Did you know this is Red Bull's first pole position in Singapore in over 10 years?

The last Red Bull driver to take pole was Sebastian Vettel in 2013.

Vettel converted that pole position to win the race at Marina Bay.

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Max Verstappen has claimed his 50th pole position, but only four other drivers have had more than 50 poles in Formula 1.

104 - Lewis Hamilton

68 - Michael Schumacher

65 - Ayrton Senna

57 - Sebastian Vettel

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Ferrari's Lewis Hamilton speaking after securing a third place start for tomorrow's race:

"Another difficult Q3. Congrats to Max, he did a great job. We made some changes to the car going into Q3, the car was feeling so much better and she felt like she had more in her, we were just pushing her more and more through the laps and sessions.

"Q1 and Q2 were awesome. We got to Q3 and snaps into Turn one and three put me two tenths down, and on the last lap I struggled with snapping. There's a real fine line with our car whether it's over the edge or under the limit. Finding the sweet spot is so difficult, I had it in the first two and lost it in the last. With hindsight maybe I shouldn't have, so it wasn't great enough from myself.

"Red Bull have done a fantastic job with their engine and car. It is still a good result for us, two Ferraris up there. I'm sure he's (Verstappen) going to be fast but hopefully together as a team, who knows, we'll see if we can get ahead of him."

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Ferrari's Charles Leclerc speaking after taking P2 in qualifying at Singapore: "Let's say that the good lap was on the right lap at the end but I had a lot of struggles in this qualifying. Q1 and Q2 was very difficult. I had some weird things going on with the brakes, car pulling a bit under braking which is not so nice on a track like here. In Q3 the lap was OK, I made some mistakes. I think there was potential to be on pole today but Max just did a better job.

"On my side, I changed the car a little bit for the last fine tunings. I was relatively happy with the car yesterday, so changed a few things but not too much. At the end of the day just a bit of misjudgement in Q3 with the wing, maybe we could have done a bit of a better job. But if you asked all the drivers on the grid, everybody can find something in that last lap of Q3."

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Red Bull's Max Verstappen, who secures pole position for the Singapore Grand Prix: "It was good. The margins are very close between us in qualifying, and I'm very happy to be on pole because this was the first one that I wanted. Very happy.

"The car has been really strong all weekend. You always look into things that could be better but it's enough for pole so happy with that.

"With the new regulations, I think our car works a little bit different to the previous regulations, where we were strong in different areas. But we take it.

"We have been on a positive trend and it's very special for us to take a pole here."

On Red Bull's inconsistent race starts this season: "Well, you have to look at it positively - it cannot get worse, it can only get better, right? So we'll see how it goes."

Right, shall we hear from the top three?

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Red Bull's Max Verstappen takes his 50th career pole in Formula 1 for the Singapore Grand Prix.

It will be his 250th race in F1 on Sunday, a number that only a handful of drivers have achieved.

A win will make those numbers all that sweeter.

11. Nico Hulkenberg (Audi)

12. Oliver Bearman (Haas)

13. Esteban Ocon (Haas)

14. Carlos Sainz (Williams)

15. Gabriel Bortoleto (Audi)

16. Franco Colapinto (Alpine)

17. Fernando Alonso (Aston Martin)

18. Alex Albon (Williams)

19. Lance Stroll (Aston Martin)

20. Sergio Perez (Cadillac)

21. Valtteri Bottas (Cadillac)

22. Isack Hadjar (Red Bull)

Harry Benjamin
BBC F1 Commentator

That qualifying session didn't really come to the crescendo I thought it might, with both Mercedes bailing out of their laps at the end, and no-one really inproving drastically. Max Verstappen's first lap was enough to secure him pole position.