#Singapore 2019

[f1archives]

Charles Leclerc & Sebastian Vettel during the team photo - Singapore, 2019

[leclercskiesahead]

Singapore 2019 🤝 Monza 2023

Charles nearly fucking up Ferrari’s best result of the year to feed his own ego

Put his own interests ahead of the team’s but chirlies will tell you it’s always the other driver who is not a team player

[ilovejevsjeans]

2019- Singapore- More messing from these two

[umseb]

sebastian vettel, p3, and lewis hamilton, p2, in parc ferme after qualifying, singapore - september 21, 2019 📷 charles coates / getty

[eobsinj]

✨ lewis hamilton - singapore 2019 ( twt | ig | fb )

[umlewis]

sebastian vettel, p3, and lewis hamilton, p2, in parc ferme after qualifying, singapore - september 21, 2019 📷 roslan rahman / getty

[windrush-child]

He’s got that Singapore glow

[schumigrace]

yall let's chat tell me in the tags what your comfort race is (i.e., what race/set of races do you go back to watch when you need a boost)

[umgeorge]

daniel ricciardo and george russell on their way to the drivers parade, singapore - september 22, 2019 📷 mark sutton / motorsport images

[lizablackthorn]

everybody moved on i stayed there

my comfort races..

[maxipad33]

“They’re still calling you Daniel. Thank you, Daniel.”

[leclercskiesahead]

Seb 2019 🤝 Carlos 2023

[ilovejevsjeans]

2019- Singapore- Catching up with George before the race

[umseb]

sebastian vettel high-fives a young fan shortly after the race, singapore - september 22, 2019

[gayferrari]

#sorry to chime in but iirc the narrative was that they pitted seb to cover off the car behind (max ig)-#and didn't expect his outlap to be *that* fast that he also undercut charles in the process#i also think ferrari admitted afterwards that they underestimated his speed on the new tyre or at least that was a very prominent narrative#in my seb fan bubble at least. honestly it was kinda funny like they went ok damn. we didn't expect him to be this fast ....#they didn't actually want seb to win but when he ended up in front they were like ok sure might as well. charles is gonna live lol#also if they ordered seb to give back the position i'm pretty sure he wouldn't have so maybe they wanted to spare themselves the arguing

@lewiseb NO THANK YOU for the clarification! I figured it must have been something like that bc I couldn't remember the #narrative (I was also in a Seb fan bubble high five). he would NOT have given back position peace and love 🥰 and they were like, whatever Charles is gonna be P3 in the wdc after tonight anyway. like I said I think it meant a lot more to the team / fans that Seb won that specific race vs. the drama that might have happened + they weren't expecting the race win drought right after

Trying to catch up with old charles lore. Could you explain to me the singapore 2019 drama, like why ferrari let seb pit first and not tell charles?

[I typed this long-ass answer my browser ATE IT then I RETYPED IT AGAIN heroically. the things I do for sebchal drama...]

omg Singapore 2019!! OK SO. I rewatched that race not too long ago and off the top of my head, I can't remember the strategy decision being that outrageous at the time. Both during race comm and in the aftermath there wasn't noise about it. I might me wrong here, but I don't think it was a strategy screw-up, per se — iirc, Seb and Max (who was just behind him) pitted on the same lap, so it might have been that it was more convenient to pit Seb because he had a clearer window, or to offset RBR strategy moves, or it might have been that Charles's tyres could hold longer. I don't think pitting Seb first was a big deal, by itself. ofc, usually when that happens between teammates, the one ahead is ordered to give back position, barring special circumstances. Seb wasn't ordered to give the position to Charles.

My two cents: if it had been the other way around — Seb starting on pole and getting undercut by his teammate who started P3 — Ferrari would have made them switch back. But in that situation, ordering Seb to switch with Charles would have been more trouble than it was worth it. Ferrari started the season with Seb as their clear #1, and by Singapore he hadn't won a race in a year and Charles was on track for his third win in a row. Like... ordering your veteran driver / multi wdc to yield a race win to his much junior teammate would have caused a bigger mess than not just keeping the race order stand. Just imagine the headlines (FERRARI HAVE LOST CONFIDENCE IN VETTEL??? etc etc etc). They're damned if he does, damned if he doesn't. (And I'm not sure Seb would have, honestly). I mostly remember the aftermath of Singapore 2019, at the time, as being a big relief to Ferrari fans and Seb fans. It was very "He's still got it, he's still here, we are so back" kinda vibe. Ferrari got their 1-2 and their third win in a row, and neither of their drivers was in serious contention for wdc by then so the individual points mattered less, but that individual win meant A LOT to Seb (who, at that point, Ferrari meant to retain! His renewal negotiations fell apart over 6 months later)

tldr, I would say the team thought that letting Seb win even if it meant Charles got done dirty was less poisonous in the long term than the other way. I don't think it was deliberate. I also don't think it was glaring incompetence as far as Binotto-era strategy choices go. Reminder that this was before Ferrari got nerfed for the illegal engine, they had absolutely no idea they wouldn't win a race again until 2022. They were fully expecting to challenge for wins again soon enough, u know?

ALSO I found this very cool picture on google AND this very fun (in hindsight) reddit comment while searching for said picture

158 upvotes.......

Anyway typing this out made me want a rancid sebchal fic where Seb is ordered to let Charles pass :)))) and who knows what happens then

[umlewis]

sebastian vettel and lewis hamilton in parc ferme after qualifying, singapore - september 21, 2019 📷 charles coates / getty