Singapore GP: Mercedes, Red Bull and Ferrari battle, but how close is it?

Mercedes restored order at the top of the timesheets in Practice Two and appear to have banished their Singapore demons of 2015. But with clear signs that Red Bull and Ferrari are renewed threats this weekend - Sky F1 analyse how close it really is between the top three teams...

The story of the practice sessions
Max Verstappen led a Red Bull one-two in Practice One as he and similarly ultrasoft-clad team-mate Daniel Ricciardo outpaced closest rival Sebastian Vettel by 0.464s - but the real surprise from the early running, on paper at least, was Mercedes down in fourth and fifth.

However, while Lewis Hamilton and Nico Rosberg were 0.8s adrift of Verstappen's benchmark, they both set their fastest times on the soft tyre, the slowest compound available this weekend, a pace described by Martin Brundle as "ominous" for the rest of the field.

Practice Two report: Rosberg fastest as Hamilton hits trouble

Ted Kravitz reported that there was a "buzz" around the pitlane ahead of Practice Two, a session where conditions are similar to race day, and in which Mercedes' faults from last year were so badly highlighted. But Rosberg moved to allay those fears with the quickest time of the day, a 1:44.152 during the qualifying runs in the first half of the session. The German finished the evening 0.275s ahead of Kimi Raikkonen's leading Ferrari, and was around 0.4s quicker than Verstappen and Ricciardo's charging Red Bulls.

But what do the timesheets miss?
The final standings, especially in P2, are potentially misleading due to the fact that three elite drivers, and Singapore masters, in Hamilton, Vettel and Ricciardo made mistakes on their flying laps.

Hamilton's stint on the ultrasofts was sloppy, with the Brit making a couple of errors around Turn One, ruining his tyres in the process. Struggling for grip, his subsequent laps were never likely to trouble the leading quartet and he finished the session 1.123s down on his team-mate. Hamilton's P2 then ended early with another mechanical glitch which prevented him from longer runs.

Christian Horner, meanwhile, made the claim that Vettel was worth "at least three tenths" around the city-state streets, but it seems even a four-time Singapore winner can make mistakes; his blunder left him 0.734s behind Raikkonen and a second adrift of Rosberg.

Hamilton suffers fresh setback

As for Ricciardo, he looked the most likely of the three to pull something out of the bag and perhaps it is his pace that should invoke the most optimism. The Australian is a street-circuit expert and is looking to go one better than his Monaco pole and second place here, and he was up on Rosberg's time through the first two sectors of his flier. However, the final corner was to be his downfall and he had to settle for fourth.

Eradicating such mistakes come the weekend's racing shouldn't be too much of a hard task for these three and without their Friday misdemeanors, we most likely would have seen a top six, and three teams, separated by less than half a second.

"For sure Red Bull and Ferrari were quick today, especially on the long runs." Rosberg admitted to Sky F1. "We have work to do."

And so what about race pace?
If Mercedes, as has been customary on most other circuits this year, hold the edge on qualifying speed, the real intrigue can be found in the long runs ahead of a race which is invariably one of the toughest on cars and tyres.

The end-of-P2 runs, when race-stint levels of fuel are added to the cars, saw all three teams complete a series of laps on the ultrasoft tyre, with Red Bull and Ferrari actually showing superior pace on Pirell's quickest compound. Ricciardo and Raikkonen both dipped into the 1:49s on several laps of their stints, whereas Rosberg's times generally moved between 1:50-51. The caveat is that Mercedes' stint lasted several laps longer.

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However, direct long-run comparisons are otherwise difficult.

While Mercedes' Rosberg and Ferrari's Vettel sampled the soft tyre, neither Red Bull ran on the yellow-marked compound all day. Conversely, Red Bull and Ferrari completed race stints on the supersoft, whereas Mercedes did not.

On comparable soft tyre stints, Rosberg's pace over 10 laps averaged out 0.8s per lap quicker than Vettel's over 14. As Brundle noted, Mercedes' low-fuel pace on that compound had looked similarly impressive.

Nonetheless, Red Bull in particular appear optimistic heading into the weekend, with Max Verstappen telling Sky F1: "After Monaco, this is definitely the best track for us."

But whether the best from Red Bull, or last year's victors Ferrari, is still enough to topple a revitalised Mercedes around Marina Bay remains the 2016 Singapore GP's big unanswered question.