Charles Leclerc (Pole, P2, 18 pts): 8.5/10
Once again it was pole position but no race victory for Charles Leclerc. The Monegasque driver had steadily worked his way to the top through the three rounds of practice (P3, P2, P1) but looked set to miss out on the pole prize at the end of qualifying when Max Verstappen put in a blazing final lap in Q3 - only to be ordered to abort before the end by the Red Bull pit wall concerned about low fuel. Never mind how he got it, Leclerc was delighted to pick up his ninth pole of the season and determined to ensure that this time it would translate to a victory. Unfortunately it didn't, and the matter was decided right at the start. Despite identical reaction times on the telemetry, Sergio Perez soundly beat Leclerc into the first corner to take the lead. Leclerc made sure he stayed within reach, biding his time for when the wet track dried out and slicks could come out to play and DRS would be enabled. That's when he threw everything into attack, but as we've seen so many times in 2022 the Red Bull is just too strong on the straights; time and again Leclerc was forced to back out of the move. Eventually his tyres got too overheated and he had to back off - which was very unfortunate as he'd have won the race if he'd managed to stay within five seconds of Perez at the line. Was someone at Ferrari not paying attention to all this?
Sergio Perez (P1, 25 pts): 9/10
A wet street track, tight and twisty even without the treacherous conditions - in hindsight, this weekend's race had Sergio Perez' name written all over it after his success earlier this year at Monaco. But initially it didn't look like Singapore was going to be anything special for the Mexican. At the end of Friday he was only ninth fastest and almost a second off the pace of his Red Bull team mate Max Verstappen. Perez wasn't looking like a top contender for pole position going into qualifying but in the end he only missed out to Charles Leclerc by just 0.022s, while Verstappen was caught out by a low fuel oversight and ended up in eighth. Suddenly Perez was the standard bearer for the team, and he meant to make the best use of it. He managed to fly into the lead into the first turn (despite identical reaction times to Leclerc) and then proceeded to manage the race to perfection, dancing out of Leclerc's reach while making sure he didn't risk melting down his intermediate tyres. Once the track dried enough to allow for slicks, Leclerc turned up the heat and tried time and again to seize the lead, but Perez calmly and determinedly fought him off. There was late drama when Perez was cited for a safety car restart infraction and was hit by a five-second post-race penalty, but fortunately he had preempted that by finishing seven and a half seconds ahead - meaning he held on to the deserved win after all.
