Bounjour, MiniFans! After yesterday’s surprising qualifying, which was the first time in the season that Verstappen’s not starting from pole position, Sunday’s ritz and glamour came around as the grid filled with celebrities and personalities, who would eventually be taken away to leave the space for the real stars of the day for the 70th Grand Prix to be held in Monaco’s streets.
A hot asphalt welcomed the drivers, who collectively agreed to ditch the soft tyres and chose between mediums, an option preferred by the top four, and hards, which were elected by the rest of the favourites for the podium. Sainz’s good start almost seemed to be rewarded as he reached Saint Devote side by side with Piastri, which ended in the Ferrari being slowed down by a puncture or a piece of the car dragging on the ground. He went wide and stopped on the side close to the Casino Square, which seemed to be the cause of the red flag that was displayed a few corners later. However, a tv shot of a destroyed Red Bull and two affected Haas made clear why the race had been stopped.
When every driver was out of their cars at the scene of the crash, which had started in Beau Rivage, the replays were needed from a few angles to cleary see what had happened. Pérez hadn’t quite left enough space for Magnussen, who still decided to try and get between the car and the wall, touching the latter in Beau Rivage and pushing Pérez so hard that the cars ended up in Massenet and took out Hulkengerg as well, leaving the track fully sprayed with debris and barriers in desperate need of repair.
The big crash had diverted eyes away from yet another clash between French teammates, as Ocon’s attempt at overtaking Gasly got him flying as Ocon’s rear tyre touched Gasly’s, lifting the rear part of his car up high and crashing back onto the track with quite a bit of force. The Alpines, along with the rest of the grid, headed to the pitlane, where they lined up in order. The official order was a bit different from how they had settled, so Sainz had to be wheeled up to be placed right behind Piastri. Those on hards changed to mediums, and the cars that had fitted mediums decided on hards, so the top four was now on white tyres, not needing to stop thanks to using both compounds.
Three quarters of an hour after the race had been stopped, it finally kicked off again. The second standing start was as clean as the first one was messy, with the cars on mediums giving their all to try and take advantage of having a softer tyre, but Monaco’s layout complicated their efforts as Leclerc led the pack. In one of those commonly surreal FIA moves, Ocon, who hadn’t rejoined the race, received a ten-second penalty for the incident with Gasly. Once their mistake was realised, they corrected it into a grid penalty.
The tyre management left the top four – Leclerc, Piastri, Sainz and Norris – getting away from Russell, who didn’t want to put a strain on his mediums and let them get away easily. The size of the gap allowed a thought to form: was Russell throwing the towel? Or was he waiting for an opportunity, letting the difference with Norris grow to a point that would allow the McLaren driver to have a free stop to try and mess with the top three? Verstappen and Hamilton were quietly following Russell, as the grid prepared for the first stops from the top to come round.
The free stop strategy was first materialised by Stroll, who had Alonso behind, and the team worked out how to open up the gap, but it was thrown away once the Canadian clipped the wall and needed to pit again. At the top, it was Mercedes to took the plunge, pitting Hamilton in an attempt to do an undercut on Verstappen, but the strategy didn’t work, not getting that position and eventually risking Russell’s as well, once Verstappen made it to his rear wing.
The battle among the top four started to heat up, gaps reducing and Norris getting extremely close to Sainz as they battled for the third and last step of the podium. Meanwhile, Russell was putting up an insane defence with his race-long medium tyres, competing with Verstappen’s fresh ones. Once the Red Bull tried for a while and couldn’t, added to the fact that Hamilton was also coming up behind him, backed ever so slightly off to try and score the fastest lap, but it became an impossible task for the Red Bull sandwiched between two Mercedes. Back at the front, the gaps had tightened among the McLarens and Sainz, but the order didn’t change either as all the championship contenders left in the race made it home safe.
Monaco is one of those weekends that is either loved dearly or loathed by the fans, with mostly the same reasoning behind both opinions: the showstopper happens on Saturday and Sunday is a parade of cars playing at getting as close to the walls without crashing as possible, without much overtaking happening and strategy taking the wheel. The tight streets caused a red flag before the first lap was even over, and that made some fear it was an omen of what might be to come for Leclerc. However, the Monegasque finally managed to break the curse that haunted any good results at his home race, finally scoring a sought after victory in the same streets that saw him grow up.
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