Vettel leads Ferrari 1-2 at Monaco
monaco — Sebastian Vettel won the strategy dominant and incident-prone Monaco Grand Prix, making it Ferrari’s first win at the principality since Michael Schumacher won it in 2001.
He was followed in second by team-mate and pole-sitter Kimi Raikkonen, and Daniel Ricciardo in third. It is the Maranello squad’s first 1-2 finish since the 2010 German Grand Prix. With chief title contender Lewis Hamilton finishing in P7, this puts Sebastian 25 points ahead of the Briton.
In what started as a race lead by the fan favourite Kimi, couldn’t continue after the Finn’s first pit-stop. The race leader was brought in to pit from the ultrasoft tyre to supersoft tyres at lap 32, which dropped the Finn down to P3 and put Sebastian into lead. That gave the German time to build some lead, with a late pit-stop planned for him later.
The icy Finn and 2007 world champion knew he wouldn’t win the race after qualifying itself, which showed in his enthusiasm in the press conference on Saturday itself. The strategy was a repeat of what Mercedes did in previous years, with a bit of a Maranello tweak to it. From what it appeared, the Finn was also seen backing the rest into the pack by dropping off 10 seconds behind his team-mate who was in lead, possibly another addition to the over-cut they attempt with the pitstops. Sebastian, who pit at lap 38 had a smooth pitstop and was able to rejoin in the same position after the 23-second lead with his team-mate seen backing the rest into the pack.
On a circuit like Monaco which has the slowest speeds of the year and the trickiest corners on the calendar, it was evident strategy was going to play the key with overtaking in the new generation F1 cars making it even tougher. However, this call by Ferrari was frowned upon by fans, as it was not the best outcome preferred, and will be discussed for days to come, with the famous term ‘team orders’ returning to the sport, a bit too early in the season.
Red Bull Racing’s Ricciardo, who started the race fifth on the grid, finished third gaining from an overcoat that elevated him ahead of Max Verstappen and Valterri Bottas. Vulture finished fourth and had to go into engine saving mode towards the end of the race while Max who was running fourth in the race at a point lost three positions after the pitstop and then got stuck in the same position for a long time.
Valterri Bottas finished fourth after starting third on the grid, but he and Kimi seemed two drivers who were struggling on the tyres post the pit change. From thereon, the Mercedes Finn was sandwiched by the two Red Bulls till the finish line.
Toro Rosso’s Carlos Sainz finished sixth followed by Lewis Hamilton in seventh. For Hamilton, it is pretty obvious the weekend did not start very well with tyre woes compromising his performance, but several retirements and a safety car period did aide him to move up the grid on one of the toughest tracks for overtaking.
Finishing eighth was Romain Grosjean, followed by Felipe Massa in ninth and followed by his teammate Kevin Magnussen in tenth. For the American outfit Haas it is their first double points finish at a race weekend since their inception as a team. The other three to finish the race were Renault’s Jolyon Palmer in 11th, and the Force India’s of Esteban Ocon and Sergio Perez in 12th and 13th respectively.
In a race where only 13 cars crossed the finish line, the first retirement was that of Nico Hulkenberg who retired due to a transmission failure in the gearbox, that lead to smoke coming out of the car ending his race at Lap 17. Another big moment was at Lap 60 when Jenson Button ended up punting Pascal Wehrlein into the barriers before the tunnel, while the German was letting the Ferraris pass when they were overlapping. The incident lead to both retiring, and a safety car period form Lap 60 to 66. Under the safety car period Marcus Ericsson went into the barriers at the swimming pool chicane due to lack of grip at the slow pace. Post the safety car Lance Stroll was asked to retire as he had temperature issue on his front left tyre and was heard complaining about tyre temperatures and brake temperatures on the pit radio.
Sergio Perez set the fastest lap of the race but had two incidents in the race. His first manoeuvre on restart was that on Stoffel Vandoorne that sent the Belgian into the barriers, while the second one was on Daniil Kyvat which is being investigated. The Mexican’s front left hit the right side pod of the Russian’s car, ending the latter’s race immediately.
Post the current result, Sebastian leads the drivers’ title with a total of 129 points, followed by Lewis who has a total of 104 points. In third place is Mercedes driver Valtteri with a total of 75 points.