Horner braced for battle ‘all the way to the end’ after Norris cuts Verstappen’s lead again in Singapore

Christian Horner has admitted that Red Bull and Max Verstappen have a battle on their hands to fend off Lando Norris over the final quarter of the season, after the McLaren driver edged ever closer via a dominant victory in Singapore.

Norris charged to pole position and the race win on the streets of Marina Bay to cut Verstappen’s championship advantage from 59 points to 52, with 180 still up for grabs across the final six rounds – including three Sprint weekends.

READ MORE: ‘We were flying the whole race’ – Norris hails ‘amazing’ Singapore win despite ‘too many close calls’

Reflecting on the weekend, and whether Verstappen's P2 represented a victory or a defeat following Red Bull’s struggles on Friday, Horner said: “First of all, you have to congratulate Lando and McLaren. They had a very strong car this weekend.

“Particularly on the first stint [with the medium tyre], they were very quick. I think on the hard tyre we looked in better shape, but of course the gap is way too big by then, at a track that anyway is very hard to overtake [on].

“On Friday night, I think if you’d have said we’ll qualify on the front row and take second place, a significant amount ahead of the rest of the field, we’d have certainly taken that. We’ve now got the best part of a month to work hard and try and bring some performance to the car in Austin.”

Pushed on how confident he feels about Verstappen’s chances of keeping Norris at bay in the title race from here, Horner commented: “I think that we’re going to fight all the way to the end of the championship.

READ MORE: Verstappen calls P2 in Singapore ‘good achievement’ but insists Red Bull ‘have to improve’ for future races

“We’re 52 points ahead with six races to go – a lot of races, a lot of points on the board. There’s a lot of racing still to happen and we’re certainly going to be fighting hard through the next triple-header and then the final triple-header after that.”

He added: “I think everybody’s massively motivated in the team. We’re still fighting obviously for both championships. We took a hit again in the constructors’ again today, but there’s some circuits [coming up] that we’ve performed very well at in the past.”

As Horner alluded to, while Verstappen remains at the top of the drivers’ standings, Red Bull lost further ground to McLaren in the constructors’ battle under the Singapore lights, with the Woking-based team now leading the way by 41 points.

It comes after another double podium finish for McLaren, courtesy of Oscar Piastri’s rise from fifth on the grid to third, and a low-key run to 10th place for Sergio Perez, who was eliminated in the second qualifying phase.

READ MORE: Perez brands his Singapore GP a ‘complete disaster’ after struggling to progress beyond P10

Addressing the Mexican’s up-and-down form once more, Horner stressed: “We need to have two drivers firing on all cylinders. Checo had a good weekend last weekend [in Azerbaijan], and he had a tough weekend this weekend.

“We need to put some weekends together where… You can see where McLaren are putting two drivers on the podium, and it’s those big points that really make a difference. We need to make sure that Checo’s as far up the field as we can get him.”