Pirelli expects one-stop strategy for 2026 Singapore GP as soft C5 could draw interest

F1 / NEWS & CONTEXTNEWS & CONTEXT

Archive photograph: Pirelli P Zero medium slick on a display car, photographed on 1 August 2026. Illustrative tyre photo. Resized and converted to WebP. · 2026-08-01Archive photo · 2026-08-01 · TaurusEmerald · CC BY-SA 4.0

Pirelli expects a one-stop strategy to be the preferred option for the 2026 Singapore Grand Prix on October 11, while the softest C5 could receive greater consideration from more than one team.

From the GPBeat newsroomPublished · 07 Oct 2026, 21:37 · 1 min

Ahead of the 2026 Singapore Grand Prix on Sunday, October 11, Pirelli expects a one-stop strategy to be the preferred option for teams. It also expects hard and medium to be the race’s reference compounds, while the softest C5 could receive greater consideration from more than one team.

Pirelli points to the time lost in the pit lane and the prospect of frequent neutralisations as reasons to favour one stop. To explain the possible C5 role, it cites Budapest, Monza and Baku, where the softest compound, it says, maintained strong pace with limited degradation and offered an advantage in grip and driver confidence.

Pirelli expects significant track evolution over the Singapore weekend and says those qualities could make the soft especially valuable there.

Additional race context

Context prepared on · 1 November 2026

What happened after this preview: Verstappen won after one stop, on lap 32. Leclerc made two stops, the second on lap 39, and finished 7.335 seconds behind. The result illustrates different strategies; it does not establish that one stop was the best choice for every driver.

Read the full race report · Source 1 · Source 2

Sources 02