Esteban Ocon (Power Unit, Lap 27): 7/10
Esteban Ocon had a good Friday at Singapore, and was ahead of his Alpine team mate Fernando Alonso in both FP1 and FP2. While the rain-shortened final practice doesn't really count, he was still doing well to finish in seventh. A place in the top ten pole shoot-out round seemed assured - but a brake issue and the fluctuating conditions in qualifying caught him out and he ended up missed the first cut, leaving him starting in a dismal 18th place. He partially compensated for that with a strong start that gained him two spots on the first lap, and he slotted in between Mick Schumacher and Valtteri Bottas where he remained for the next 20 laps. He was looking solid but wasn't able to make any progress on a track that is notoriously tricky to overtake on; the question of whether he could have found a way to get into the points became moot when the engine shut off on lap 27 leaving Alpine with a troublesome double DNF this week.
Yuki Tsunoda (Accident): 5.5/10
Another driver to have had his contract renewed since the previous race in Monza, Yuki Tsunoda didn't have much time to celebrate before getting hit in the face with the realities of night racing on Singapore's tricky street circuit. He was P15 in first practice and then seventeenth in FP2. But on Saturday, after enduring the rain-hit final practice, he suddenly found his feet in the changeable conditions of qualifying to make it through to to the final round and put himself into the top ten for the start of the race. He got a good start and gained a place off the grid, but then handed it back to Max Verstappen on lap 3 before becoming the meat in an Aston Martin sandwich through to lap 20. A mistake saw him passed by three cars in a single lap (Stroll, Ricciardo and Schumacher); and then he was among the first batch of drivers to switch to slicks. He was immediately out of his depth and ran wide to crash in turn 10 to bring out the final safety car of the day. Just as well he inked that contract renewal when he did, really.
