Lewis Hamilton's mysterious Ferrari radio blackout: What we know after Singapore chaos

Lewis Hamilton's Singapore Grand Prix was ruined by a bad strategy call on Sunday, which he apologised for over the radio on the cooldown lap.

Those are the two facts that nobody is arguing about.

The rest – exactly what Hamilton was apologising for, what the crucial moment of disaster was – is less clear.

This being the internet, there has been plenty of wild speculation and enthusiastic conspiratorialism in the hours since the chequered flag waved, some of it more founded in reality than others.

As such, it's time for us to get the detective hats and pipes out of the GPFans Towers to separate fact from fiction, fiction from fact, and the knowable from the (currently) unknowable.

What went from for Lewis Hamilton at the Singapore Grand Prix?

Hamilton's race appeared to hinge around him not coming into the pits for new tyres under a virtual safety car with about 25 laps remaining – the perfect time to take a final set of soft tyres, although the Brit appeared to be running strongly on his existing set.

There was some surprise when he didn't come in behind team-mate Charles Leclerc to double-stack, with the VSC meaning that the stops would cost much less time than they would under green flag conditions, but the apparent long life of the soft tyre and Hamilton's frustration at being stuck behind Leclerc provided a potential explanation at the time.

In the event, his tyres fell off a cliff with about a dozen laps to go, falling from a strong third place down to sixth by the end – losing more than two seconds a lap in the final stages.

"Sorry boys, I let you down today with that strategy," he said on the radio to the team on his cool-down lap. "My call, and I lost us valuable points. I'll try and make up for it in the next one. Great job with the pit stop though."

Where did the controversy start?

After the race, Ferrari team principal Fred Vasseur said over and over again, to a number of different outlets, that Hamilton had been told to pit under the VSC and 'missed the pit entry'.

Fans who had been watching the seven-time champ's individual TV feed, complete with radio communications, immediately accused the Frenchman of lying – saying that no such message was ever relayed on the feed that they were watching and listening to.

They claimed that Hamilton's later apology came because he subsequently chose to tough out the strategy post-VSC rather than pit under green, hoping that another would be triggered or that his tyres would make it to the end.

Fact

Fred Vasseur was not just wilfully lying about signalling Hamilton to pit. Aside from all of the other supporting evidence, team principals who have had a good relationship with their driver for more than two decades don't just go out into the media and lie about them for no reason. This is a conspiracy theory for the hard of thinking.

Unfortunately for the sake of clarity, Hamilton was unable to attend his post-race media obligations after feeling unwell and getting checked over by FIA medics.

However, he did release a short comment via Ferrari's media team, in which he said: "Under VSC, the team called me in but I missed the [pit] entry."

A longer comment from Hamilton a little later in the evening confirmed that he was responsible for at least two strategy calls – starting on medium tyres (which backfired, with the yellow-rimmed rubber performing badly) and deciding to 'stay out and try to hold track position to the end' after missing pit entry, a phrase he repeated, under the VSC.

That explains the Brit's apology to his team. But what about the missing radio messages?

Ferrari's missing messages

What seems absolutely inarguable is that something went wrong with Hamilton's radio around the time of the VSC. This isn't especially uncommon around street circuits specifically – as referenced on Sky Sports' broadcast before this conversation ever began.

The audio and video on Hamilton's feed was clearly affected around the time the VSC was deployed and, if that wasn't evidence enough, there was also no message from the team about the VSC ending. There is always a message from the team about the VSC ending.

Instead, that seven-minute dead period between messages pre- and post-VSC points very strongly to a technical issue. What's unclear is whether that was an issue with the feed from Hamilton's car and radio to the broadcast, or an issue with the team's radio communications specifically. Essentially, could Hamilton and his team still converse while the feed went blank of transmissions between driver and pit wall?

Hamilton's statement about 'missing' pit entry, coupled with Vasseur's quotes after the race, would indicate that they could and that Hamilton was aware of the team's wishes to come in.

“We called two cars," Vasseur told the media. "‘Guys, you pit behind the VSC.’ One of my guys said, ‘no, I prefer to stay on track’. He said, ‘I missed the pit entry’. Don't blame the team.”

The only thing which appears truly up for debate is whether Hamilton 'missed' the pit entry deliberately or inadvertently. That's something that, most likely, only the man himself will be able to tell us when he next speaks to the press.

F1 HEADLINES: Lewis Hamilton 'let down' Ferrari as Kim Kardashian opens up on Sky Sports

RESULTS: Singapore GP times and positions

Written by

Chris Deeley - Editor

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