Daniel Ricciardo was less than half a second behind race winner Nico Rosberg as they crossed the finishing line on Sunday, making it the closest finish to an F1 race for six years.
Ironically it had been Mercedes’ decision to bring Lewis Hamilton in for a pit stop a few laps earlier which ultimately gave Red Bull the opportunity to do the same thing and put Rosberg under pressure. It produced an exciting conclusion to the Singapore Grand Prix which duly earned its second-highest rating from F1 Fanatic readers.
Appropriately, the only Singapore Grand Prix to receive a higher rating so far was the 2010 edition. when Fernando Alonso beat Sebastian Vettel by an even smaller margin. Here’s what you made of Sunday’s race.
Loved it!
First, for the strategy battles which were as tense as ever. If you don’t see two passes each lap it doesn’t mean there’s no action going on. It’s just on a different level and I find it as exciting as the physical battles on track.
Second, for the actual fights we had all over the place: Kvyat versus Verstappen was a classic, Raikkonen versus Hamilton was as exciting as hell (I lost my voice shouting at that), that three-cars moment with Vettel as well was to be remembered.
Third, you got to see all the team mates from top three teams going on different ways into the race only to find themselves all close together in the end. This is a remainder that those people know very well what they’re doing.
stefano (@alfa145)
Great race from start to finish. It got ‘boring’ for about five laps after the half way mark. Then it was on again! Started with contact off the line, finished with half a second between first and second.
The highlights were Kvyat’s defense on Verstappen early on the race, Raikkonen on Hamilton, Vettel’s climb through the order, the perfection from all the big pit-crews to pull off the absolutely staggering amount of varying tyre-strategies and the will-he wont-he last 15 laps.
Again no track limits rubbish or silly penalties ruining the result. Just want to note compared to last week the camera direction was amazing, vastly improved, good footage of the important stops as they happened. Lots of footage throughout the field when the start of the race when the front of the field was dull. And then focusing on the gaps between the leaders towards the end when that mattered.
Tristan
Not everyone was blown away by the action, however, and a few suspected Mercedes weren’t in as much trouble as they let on.
Started with some chaos before turning rather dull (bar Kvyat and Vestappen’s battle) until the final round of stops upped the tension and brought a bit of excitement, which sadly turned to naught as the race finished just as Riccardo got within striking range.
I don’t buy that Rosberg had a brake issue as he pulled out a gap early on when they were apparently critical while Hamilton wrestled a clearly poorly set up car around.
Craig Wilde (@wildfire15)
Good overtakes by Verstappen but only on mid-field runners. Ricciardo’s charge at the end summed up all that is wrong with F1 currently, change tyres and suddenly your car is several seconds a lap quicker than the race leader.
Both Mercedes had brake issues from the start but still managed to finish first and third, Ferrari are a joke spending so much money for so little return. The mid-field teams are all also-rans with about as much chance of winning a race as I do winning an Olympic gold.
Yet another season is drawing to a close with very little to put on a highlights reel.
John Toad (@ceevee)
The race also featured the alarming sight of a marshal running back to his post when the race was restarted before the track had been fully cleared.
The guy on the track, that’s really not good to see. I didn’t like that at all, really dangerous. Not OK.
@Mike
Huge miscommunication obviously. Hope whoever did the camera directing didn’t get sacked for showing the replay.
The focus on the near-miss should ensure a good investigation into the stewarding practices before something worse happens.
Tristan
That drama aside, it was a race which left this ticketholder happy.
Loved it. The strategy battle between the front runners and the build up of tension during the second half in particular had the entire crowd on the edge of our seats.
The driving was amazing this year. Other than the first lap, I don’t recall any of them driving wildly off the track or any yellow flags for that matter.
Brilliant day, brilliant race. Pity Ricciardo couldn’t run Rosberg down but way closer than we’ve seen for a while.
DB-C90 (@Dbradock)
2016 Rate the Race Results
Race | Average score |
---|---|
2016 Spanish Grand Prix | 8.706 |
2016 Austrian Grand Prix | 8.097 |
2016 Chinese Grand Prix | 7.853 |
2016 Australian Grand Prix | 7.757 |
2016 Monaco Grand Prix | 7.747 |
2016 Bahrain Grand Prix | 7.382 |
2016 Belgian Grand Prix | 7.249 |
2016 Singapore Grand Prix | 7.112 |
2016 Canadian Grand Prix | 6.583 |
2016 British Grand Prix | 6.478 |
2016 German Grand Prix | 5.814 |
2016 Russian Grand Prix | 5.396 |
2016 Hungarian Grand Prix | 5.052 |
2016 Italian Grand Prix | 4.944 |
2016 European Grand Prix | 4.728 |
Singapore Grand Prix Rate the Race results
Race | Average score |
---|---|
2010 Singapore Grand Prix | 7.194 |
2016 Singapore Grand Prix | 7.112 |
2015 Singapore Grand Prix | 6.552 |
2014 Singapore Grand Prix | 6.433 |
2011 Singapore Grand Prix | 6.390 |
2008 Singapore Grand Prix | 6.302 |
2012 Singapore Grand Prix | 5.998 |
2013 Singapore Grand Prix | 5.973 |
2009 Singapore Grand Prix | 5.336 |
Rate the Race
View more Rate the Race results:
- Rate the Race: The F1 Fanatic Top 100
- Rate the Race: The F1 Fanatic Bottom 10
- Rate the Race: Circuit ratings
Rate the Race appears immediately after every grand prix finishes. To join in simply register a free F1 Fanatic account. If you do not have one, register an account here or read more about registering here.
2016 Singapore Grand Prix
- Narrow Singapore Driver of the Weekend win for Rosberg
- Singapore Grand Prix gets second-highest rating
- 2016 Singapore Grand Prix Predictions Championship results
- 2016 Singapore Grand Prix team radio transcript
- Top ten pictures from the 2016 Singapore Grand Prix
BJ (@beejis60)
22nd September 2016, 14:06
I fail to see how; was a snoozefest to me sans the first few laps and the last maybe 5-7 laps.
Tristan
22nd September 2016, 14:23
I’d genuinely love to know what could be improved in your estimation? I still think Kvyat’s defense against Verstappen was the most thrilling driving we’ve seen all year. He had ‘nads the size of Texas to pull that off not only on the track but politically it probably signed his doom as a Red Bull driver as well.
hyoko
22nd September 2016, 22:08
I agree it was a brave defense, but Dan Kvyat’s future in Red Bull/Toro Rosso (or lack thereof) was already sealed, I’m afraid.
drmouse (@drmouse)
22nd September 2016, 14:50
I fail to understand this. There were all the important elements of F1 in there: Wheel to wheel racing, great attacking and defending, and exciting strategic battle, competitors out of place on the grid… There may have been a handful of laps where I was not on the edge of my seat, but still far from a snoozefest.
B (@)
22nd September 2016, 15:00
Some fans don’t understand the intricacies of F1 as a team sport. They only see the driver bit.
drmouse (@drmouse)
22nd September 2016, 15:04
In that case, I don’t understand how they can ever have been fans of F1. The driver element has never been that exciting, on it’s own, except for the odd exceptional race. Even looking back at classic seasons, before I got into it (in my teens in the 90s), it was only exciting if taken as a whole.
B (@)
22nd September 2016, 18:15
You’re right.
nase
22nd September 2016, 14:30
‘Ricciardo’s charge at the end summed up all that is wrong with F1 currently, change tyres and suddenly your car is several seconds a lap quicker than the race leader.’
I fail to see how that is wrong. I just don’t get it. Sometimes, I am so bewildered by a comment that I just don’t know what to say.
Maybe I’ll just throw in a comparison: 1986 Spanish GP (Jerez). With 10 laps to go, Mansell pits for fresh rubber while Senna continues on used tyres. Starting his final chase some 19 seconds behind Senna, Mansell almost manages to overtake the Lotus driver on the final straight, missing the victory by just 14/1000th of a second.
I thought that was a classic. Or was that already a sign of what is wrong in F1 (and already was wrong 30 years ago)?
My Left Eye (@blik)
22nd September 2016, 15:20
So tyres used to degrade then. Some carry on as if it’s a new thing.
nase
22nd September 2016, 16:27
Yeah, that’s more or less my point. I guess.
John Toad (@)
22nd September 2016, 18:37
The point I was trying to make, and obviously failing, is this:
There are complaints about Mercedes being so dominant and generally a second or so faster than their closest rivals but the difference between fresh tyres and old tyres is much greater than any gap that the Mercedes engine/chassis has.
If you want to have close racing you need small gaps in all aspects of the technologies used which includes not only the engine/chassis combinations but also the different grades of tyres.
nase
23rd September 2016, 10:34
@ceevee
I see, but I don’t think I can agree.
If every performance-relevant component of an F1 car performed similarly over its life cycle, we would end up with the exact opposite of excitingly close racing. Instead, we’d end up with a field of cars more or less inching away from the car behind.
Racing desperately needs variables that overshadows the differences between the cars, such as fuel loads or tyre performance (and maybe engine settings in a scenario where it is not possible to use the highest engine settings over an entire race) because the fundamental problem of cars struggling to follow each other closely is a physical constraint that can be somewhat mitigated, but it’ll never disappear or become negligible.
With tyres that do not degrade siginificantly, strategic variation would cease to exist. One stop per race would be the only viable strategy (or zero, if there was no obligation to use more than one compound). There would be no such thing as an overcut or undercut, just cars following each other around the track lap after lap after lap …
To put it bluntly: I still do not understand your point, because physics.
Jon (@johns23)
23rd September 2016, 3:15
Surprising result. Average race i thought
banana88x (@banana88x)
23rd September 2016, 4:07
It was rated pretty average comparing the 2016 races
sato113 (@sato113)
23rd September 2016, 6:49
Boring race for me
ILuvSoundtracks (@)
23rd September 2016, 16:59
Can’t be better than 2010.
George (@george)
24th September 2016, 17:24
Best part of the race for me? Watching the Ferrari garage acting like headless chickens after Hamilton’s stop! They clearly had no idea what to do in that situation, they really need to fix their strategy department.