McLaren can win their first world championship title of the year ahead of schedule in Singapore – after missing out in Baku, their chances are even higher this time around.
After McLaren missed its first chance to secure the 2025 Constructors’ Championship title ahead of schedule at the last Formula 1 race in Baku, the Woking-based team now has its second match point at the night race in Singapore.
The starting position: With seven races to go, McLaren leads the Constructors’ Championship with 623 points, followed by Mercedes (290 points), Ferrari (286) and Red Bull (272).
A maximum of 346 points are still up for grabs in the team standings before the checkered flag at the season finale in Abu Dhabi. 301 in the seven main races and another 45 in the three sprints still on the schedule in Austin, Brazil, and Qatar. This means that Red Bull can no longer become world champions. Max Verstappen’s team is currently already 351 points behind. Mercedes (333 points behind) and Ferrari (337) still have a chance of winning the title, at least mathematically. However, with only 303 points left to be awarded after Singapore, both teams will have to score significantly more points than McLaren this weekend to stay in the race. Mercedes needs to score 31 points more than McLaren, Ferrari even 35.
Conversely, this means that the Ferrari team, which has yet to win a race this season, must win Sunday’s race to remain in contention for the title. Without the 25 points for a victory, 35 points in a single race are unattainable.
Mercedes, on the other hand, would “only” need to get both cars on the podium to collect the necessary 31 points. Even a seventh place for one of the two drivers would be enough if the other driver wins Sunday’s race at the same time.
However, this calculation only works for both Ferrari and Mercedes if McLaren remains pointless at the same time.
This is because the team from Woking can become world champions this weekend on its own – and the hurdle for this is actually very low. If McLaren scores at least 13 points in Singapore, which could be achieved with a sixth and seventh place finish, for example, Mercedes and Ferrari would no longer be able to become world champions, even with a double victory on Sunday.
In summary: McLaren will become world champion on Sunday if it either scores at least 13 points itself or, in the event of a worse result, loses a maximum of 30 points to Mercedes and 34 points to Ferrari.
Considering that McLaren has only scored less than 13 points in Canada (12 points) and at the last Grand Prix in Baku (6) so far this year, it is very likely that the world championship will be decided on Sunday.
