Another software mess: how a race control error hit Singapore Sprint Qualifying
The FIA admits a human error left some cars without Overtake Mode in SQ1. Williams, Racing Bulls and Aston Martin paid the price, and the result stands.
For the second race weekend in a row, F1’s software has become the story.
In the first part of Sprint Qualifying in Singapore on Friday night, some cars had more power than others. It had nothing to do with the teams or the drivers. It was a human error in race control, and the FIA has admitted it. The result still stands.
What happened
SQ1 was red-flagged so marshals could clear debris from Sergio Perez’s Cadillac. When the session restarted, Overtake Mode, which gives the cars extra electrical power, should have been available. It was not switched back on.
Several drivers reported being down on power. Race control then turned Overtake Mode on, but only for 27 seconds before switching it off again.
So some cars got the boost on their lap and some did not. It came down to when they started their run and where they were on track during those 27 seconds. The FIA said the error “had an impact on the performance of certain cars”.
There was a separate problem too. A timing fault failed to record some SQ1 lap times, leaving drivers unsure if they had made it through. The FIA says the two issues were unrelated.
Who lost out
Six drivers went out in SQ1: Arvid Lindblad, Lance Stroll, Alex Albon, Perez, Valtteri Bottas and Carlos Sainz. Lindblad, Stroll and both Williams drivers were hit hardest.
Sainz, last in 22nd, did not hold back. “Half of the cars did their laps with half a second quicker engine than the others,” he said.
He also questioned how the FIA handles these moments: “I’m a bit confused why the sport keeps doing different things depending on who is out in Q1 or who is out in Lap 1.”
Why the result stands
Williams asked for all 22 cars to go through to SQ2. The stewards said no, reportedly unsure they had the power to do it. Re-running SQ1 was ruled out too, because there were not enough spare sets of tyres.
Williams and Racing Bulls are frustrated, but neither plans to protest. Aston Martin is not protesting for now either, but it wants to know exactly what happened. The FIA’s single-seater director, Nikolas Tombazis, met the affected teams and drivers.
Twice in a week
Six days earlier at Sepang, a software bug left cars crawling on the formation lap and delayed the start by 93 minutes. We looked at what that says about the 2026 cars in our piece on F1’s software problem.
Singapore was different. This time it was a person, not a bug. But the result was the same: a setting, not a driver, decided who went fast.
Our take
One mistake is bad luck. Two weekends in a row is a pattern. If race control can switch a car’s power on and off, teams and fans deserve to see it happen live.
