Max Verstappen spent his weekend off standing on a podium — just not the one you’re picturing. The Red Bull driver popped over to the Nürburgring for some GT mileage, won there too, and flew out with a fresh hit of confidence just as Formula 1 heads to Singapore. Which, for a man staring at a 69-point deficit to Oscar Piastri with seven to go, might be exactly what he needs.
The context matters. For most of 2025, the championship conversation has lived in McLaren orange. Piastri leads it, Lando Norris has been his constant shadow, and the RB21 looked too knife-edge to live with the papaya pair over a season. Red Bull were frank about it earlier in the year: the car was a handful, the upgrade runway was short, and 2026 loomed large.
Then Monza happened. Red Bull rolled out a new floor, the balance snapped into place, and Verstappen promptly won in Italy before doing it again in Baku. With McLaren tripping over themselves in Azerbaijan, the gap shrank from 104 to 69. Suddenly, the reigning champion has daylight.
“Seven race to go and it’s still 69 points,” Verstappen told Sky Sports F1 after Baku. “It’s a lot.” He didn’t sugarcoat the route back into the fight: “Basically everything needs to go perfect from my side, and then a bit of luck from their side I need as well, you know. It’s still very tough.”
What he didn’t say was, “I’m out.” And that’s the bit that caught the eye of Jamie Chadwick on the Sky Sports F1 desk. “I think it’s a long shot, but it’s still a shot of some degree,” she said. “And just the last two race weekends alone, the momentum in that team is ginormous. We keep talking about momentum and how significant it is, and I’m not ruling him out.”
Bernie Collins, formerly on the strategy wall, circled the next venue on the calendar as a sweet spot. “Singapore is another driver track,” she said. “Singapore rewards bravery, particularly in qualifying, and who better to take that on than Max?” It’s a fair point. Marina Bay punishes hesitation. You lean on the car between the walls, get the tyres in the window, and live with the consequences. If the RB21’s new platform gives Verstappen that front-end bite he’s been chasing, Q3 under the lights could tilt his way.
None of that guarantees anything on Sunday, of course. Singapore’s race is a physical slog and a strategic trap. Safety cars show up uninvited. Track position is king, but the undercut bites if you blink. And McLaren, for all of Baku’s bruises, have been relentlessly sharp in 2025. Piastri’s composure has been a theme of the year, Norris’ qualifying peaks have been lethal, and both have a car that loves slow-corner traction — exactly what Marina Bay demands.
Still, Red Bull’s momentum isn’t pretend. Across Monza and Baku, Verstappen didn’t just win; he looked in control. The new floor seems to have calmed the RB21’s spikiness on entry, and with that, the old Max rhythms reappeared: brake later, carry more, manage the race. It also helps that while others tilt their gaze toward 2026, Red Bull found one last meaningful step in 2025. It’s late to the party, but very on-brand.
And then there’s that Nürburgring cameo. It won’t hand him any points in Singapore, but it says something about his headspace. On a weekend when most of the grid decompressed, Verstappen went racing, won in a different discipline, and kept the winning muscle warm. Confidence is currency ahead of a street circuit that chews through it.
Here’s the brutal math: 69 points with seven rounds left is a mountain. Verstappen needs perfection on his side of the garage, and he probably needs McLaren to blink at least twice. But if Singapore tilts Red Bull’s way, the narrative tightens quickly. One more win — and a messy night for the papaya cars — and the championship stops feeling like a procession and starts feeling like a chase.
If it doesn’t? If Piastri and Norris lock out the front row and convert? Then Verstappen’s fifth straight title probably slips into the “not this year” column, and all eyes pivot to the bigger picture heading into the 2026 reset.
For now, it’s as simple as this: the champion has a car he trusts again, a circuit built for nerve and precision, and a scoreboard that still gives him a puncher’s chance. Singapore’s walls have settled plenty of arguments over the years. They’re about to host another one.
