5 GREATEST MONACO GRANDS PRIX
1961:
SIR STIRLING MOSS rated this his finest grand prix drive. In a year-old Lotus, he held the three ‘sharknose’ Ferraris behind him for an eternity, setting fastest lap after fastest lap, going 2.8 seconds below his own pole mark. The Ferraris finished two-three-four.
1982:
SOME final two laps. Uncharacteristically, Alain Prost crashes out. Riccardo Patrese takes the he lead. He then loses control. Didier Pironi leads. He retires, having run out of fuel. Andrea de Cesaris aris is the new leader. He also runs out of fuel. Lo and behold, Patrese (above), having recovered with the help of a push start, comes back to take victory.
1992:
THE epic duel between Nigel Mansell and Ayrton Senna. The Brit was leading commandingly in his Williams until til a loose wheel nut forced him to pit. The stop was sluggish. Senna (above) passed. Then a possessed Mansell, as if stuck to Senna’s gearbox, harried the Brazilian all the way to the line. It was heroic but not quite enough.
1996:
PERHAPS S the most extraordinary of the lot. A wet-weather thriller with the e unlikeliest of victors, Olivier Panis Pi (b (above). ) With 14 retirements, just three cars finished: the Ligier of Frenchman Panis, the McLaren of David Coulthard and the Sauber of Johnny Herbert. Panis never won again.
2008:
A BRILLIANT comeback win by Lewis Hamilton, his first at Monaco. . Hamilton (above) ve) punctured a tyre on a barrier, took a timely stop and was helped by a safety car, then drove with sure-footed maturity in the testing, wet conditions as his putative title rival Felipe Massa slipped and slid.