While Fernando Alonso’s win for Ferrari makes the Spanish former-champion the man to watch in the last few races of the season, Mark Webber’s third place at the Singapore Grand Prix, which helped him open up an 11-point gap at the top of the Drivers Championship, was eye-catching for tyre-based reasons, as Bridgestone Motorsport Tyre Development director Hirohide Hamashima explained: “Mark showed the durability of the medium compound by completing almost all of the race distance on the same set of tyres. Not only did Mark’s tyres continue to deliver strong performance, but they also withstood the contact with Lewis [Hamilton]. In this contact the front right tyre sidewall was pushed out of alignment with the rim, yet it retained its inner pressure for the rest of the race. We can say that this tyre displayed true Japanese grit today.”