Carlos Sainz opens up on strategy behind intentionally giving Lando Norris DRS at the end of the 2023 F1 Singapore GP

Carlos Sainz recently explained his strategy to keep Lando Norris, George Russell, and Lewis Hamilton behind him during the intense last laps of the 2023 F1 Singapore GP. The Spaniard drove brilliantly around the Marina Bay circuit and won his first race of the season, breaking Max Verstappen's and Red Bull's long record of consecutive victories.

Speaking to the media, Sainz initially revealed Ferrari's aim to focus more on tire management due to their poor degradation rate. After the safety car, he knew that he needed to take the new hard tires until the very end of the race.

“Given our limitations with tire wear and degradation, it was all about managing the beginning of each stint to make sure I made it to the target lap that we wanted to do in each compound. Obviously, the Safety Car forced us to pit even earlier than we wanted, and I knew it was going to be a long speed on the hards,” Sainz said (via PlanetF1).

Furthermore, Carlos Sainz stated that he had to stop George Russell's charge from P3 since the latter was on fresh medium tires after the safety car. To stop both Russell and Hamilton in P3 and P4, respectively, the Ferrari driver essentially used Lando Norris, who was in P2, as a buffer between him and the two Mercedes cars.

Sainz intentionally gave Norris the DRS so that he could push forward and defend against the Mercedes, not only for himself but for Sainz as well.

“I had to get George slowing down, not to give him a Safety Car or medium tire opportunity, and it worked to perfection. It was just quite tight at the end, but we gave Lando a bit of the DRS to help him, and, in the end, we made it P1,” Sainz explained.

---

Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz not getting overly optimistic after Ferrari's great pace in the 2023 F1 Singapore GP

Both Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz are not too excited about Ferrari's drastically improved pace around the Marina Bay Circuit. They are rather cautious about the future.

“Well, again, this weekend, it feels particularly good and much better than the high downforce tracks in the past. As I've said before, I think we found something in Monza that should go a step forward but definitely not as much as what we've seen this weekend," Leclerc told Sportskeeda.

"So I think our car is fitting these track characteristics in particular. And, yeah, we shouldn't get carried away and I am not enough confident now to say that it will be the case for the rest of the season. Have we done a step forward? Yes. Will it be like that until the end of the season? It’s too early to say,” he added.

The Singapore GP winner, Carlos Sainz also agreed with Leclerc's comments.