RaceFans has reported:

George Russell said he was “overly confident” when he crashed out of the Singapore sprint race on Oct. 10, accepting blame for the incident that ended his race. He had started second, took the lead from pole-winner Max Verstappen at the start, then ran wide while completing the second lap on the wet track.

“I just misjudged it, to be honest,” Russell said. “I came around the corner, I came on the throttle, I got more power than I was expecting from the battery. I went a little bit wide and then I touched the white line.”

“The number one rule in the rain is don’t touch the white lines. It’s a very, very silly mistake. Overly confident,” he said. “I think it’s my first crash of the year. It was annoying to happen from that position.”

The crash left Mercedes needing to repair Russell’s car before qualifying. The session was initially delayed by half an hour after the sprint race finished late; the race itself had started late because of heavy rain. Qualifying was then delayed until 9:30 p.m. local time.

Russell was due to start at the back of the grid regardless of his qualifying performance because he had received a penalty for changing his power unit. The sprint result also saw Verstappen win after Russell crashed out of the lead on the wet circuit.

Verstappen said Formula 1 should not hold sprint races at tracks where passing is not possible. Separately, Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri were under investigation over a crash on the final lap in Singapore. The incident involving Russell was described as his first crash of the year.

The report was written by Keith Collantine and published at 12:21 p.m. on Oct. 10, 2026, with an update at 12:29 p.m. Collantine, a lifelong motor sport fan, established RaceFans in 2005 under its original name, F1 Fanatic. He had previously worked as a motoring journalist and began running the site full-time in 2010, fulfilling his ambition to focus entirely on motor racing.