Report: Battling the Brakes in Singapore

Alex battled through 59 laps to finish P18 around the Marina Bay Circuit

Published

11 OCT 2026

Est. reading time

2 min

Alex Albon had a long evening run in the 2026 Singapore GP as he struggled with brake issues throughout the race to finish in the pit lane with a P18 classification.

After rain affected Saturday’s Sprint and last weekend’s running in Sepang, there was no repeat of wet weather running to mix up the order on the Singapore Sunday. Alex, like nine other drivers, started his race on Medium Pirellis, and found grip to launch up from P16 to P15 past Gabriel Bortoleto.off the line.

Frustratingly, that would be the highest he would run as out of place drivers behind filtered through and the high ambient temperatures and humidity hit. George Russell was the first to demote Alex down, passing Albono at Turn 1 to drop the No.23 to P16.

A Lap 8 retirement from Bortoleto triggered an early and brief VSC, but no teams chose to pit so early in the race. Instead, the Audi’s DNF allowed Isack Hadjar one fewer car to pass on his recovery drive, and the Red Bull was the next driver to pass Alex, this time at Turn 7.

Radio messages between Alex’s race engineer James Urwin and his driver raised concerns over the increasing brake temperatures to blunt any attacking possibilities. The severity level was high before the VSC slowdown and, although the reduced speed running helped, the temperatures remained high over the remaining laps.

Pitting for Softs on Lap 23 dropped Alex down to P19 as others stayed out, though he filtered back up to P17 as others stopped and Franco Colapinto retired. Nonetheless, the brake temperature issue remained, and Alex fell behind those ahead until a second stop on Lap 39.

A second set of Softs was the order, and no sooner had Alex returned to the track had Lance Stroll stopped to trigger a second VSC period. That retirement put Alex into P17 and chasing down the sister Aston Martin of Fernando Alonso. Frustratingly, however, any hopes of passing the Spaniard would not pan out as the team issued instructions to slow down to avoid retiring.

Despite lifting and coasting, Alex did not cross the line, and instead retired in the pit lane one lap early, dropping to P18 as Sergio Perez completed the lap Alex did not. Alex leaves the tripleheader without reaching the chequered flag in any of the three races and will now enjoy a weekend off before flying to the Americas.