Norris takes Monaco victory ahead of challenging Leclerc
Pole sitter Lando Norris has taken the victory at this year's Monaco Grand Prix. Although Leclerc and Piastri finished closely behind the race, including two stops was perfectly under Norris' control from start to finish, leading to his first win at the principality.
Tyres and pitstops are talk of the moment on race day at Monaco with the starting tyres very different across the field. Under sunny skies, tyre degradation is also expected to be quite high while the FIA has mandated two pitstops this race to avoid the procession one would risk to have otherwise.
The top three started on medium with Lando Norris enjoying the benefit of being on pole position, ahead of Charles Leclerc. When the lights went out Leclerc clearly had the better start and Norris locked op the front right severely to maintain the advantage into Turn 1.
There ware no position changes in front but when Bortoleto ended up in the barriers right before the tunnel, a virtual safety car was instated. As Bortoleto managed to reverse and then return to the pits to continue the race, a few drivers immediately opted to make a stop, including Tsunoda, Gasly, Bearman and of course Bortoleto himself.
Bortoleto blamed Antonelli for his crash as the latter had opted to try to re-pass the Brazilian after they had done the reverse at the hairpin.
While Norris slowly built his advantage to Leclerc, Gasly then ended up hitting the rear of Tsunoda. After blaming his brakes he went straight on at the chicane after breaking the front left suspension, nearly ending up hitting his teammate. Gasly managed to return to the pits under yellow flag conditions following which the pitlane was closed for 2 laps.
These double yellows to alert drivers of debris on track clearly wasn't handled by every driver the same way. Piastri for instance was very careful, leading to Max ending up right on his tail and very menacing for the subsequent laps, probably also helped by his choice for hard tyres versus Piastri's mediums.
Alonso also questioned his team whether Hadjar, the car ahead of him, had respected all the yellow flags.
Speaking of which, Hadjar was pitted on lap 15, switching to soft tyres and returning to the track in 8th place, comfortably ahead of a train led by Lawson with Albon, Sainz, Russell, Antonelli, Stroll and Tsunoda, Bearman and Bortoleto all following closely.
Alonso and Ocon pitted on lap 17, changing hard to medium compound tyres. Alonso was annoyed to be out behind Hadjar again, shouting "I can't push now" when his engineer encouraged him to keep pushing.
Sure enough, 4 laps later, Hadjar pitted again, returning to the track once again ahead of the Lawson train. When that was done Lawson suddenly upped the pace again, clearly having backing down everyone to make room for Hadjar's stops.
Norris and Piastri meanwhile pitted as well while, bringing them into 3rd and 4th with LecLerc the new race leader. Hamilton on the other hand made a greatest stop and jumped both Hadjar and Alonso in the stops.
Leclerc pitted on lap 25 and returned to the track on hard tyres, 5s behind Norris and 3s ahead of Piastr who were also on hard tyres in this second stint.
Verstappen continues for another 3 laps before pitting, exchanging his hard tyres from the start to a set of mediums. He returned to the track in fourth place, not too far behind Piastri.
When Albon pitted on lap 34 he managed to return to the track in 10th, still ahead of Sainz. After Lawson had upped the pace, clearly Williams thought it was a good idea to do the same for Albon, letting Sainz back up the cars behind him to make some room for a stop. At nearly the halfway point, this left Sainz, Russell and Antonelli as the remaining drivers without a pitstop yet.
A few laps later Alonso had smoke coming out of the back of his Aston Martin, leaving him with no option but to retire the car. He did so handily in a run-off area, requiring race control to only bring out a yellow flag for a brief period before all was clear again.
On lap 42 Lawson and Albon both pitted, both opting for hard tyres and both out again easily ahead of Sainz as the Spaniard continued to go easy with the Mercedes duo, Hulkenberg, Stroll and Bearman stuck behind him. To make it even more silly, Albon then waited to let Sainz passed before switching in behind his teammate and take over the task of backing up the train. For Mercedes that meant their only serious hope for points was at least one safety car.
Up in front the gaps remained relatively small with Norris leading by 5 seconds, then Leclerc, Piastri 9s behind the Ferrari with Verstappen trailing him at least than 1.5 seconds. Hamilton in 5th followed 20s further behind and Hadjar was another 55s extra further down and already a lap down on the race leader. This with 30 laps remaining.
On lap 48 Piastri was pitted for a fresh set of hard tyres. Leclerc was switched to mediums the next lap.
In that same lap Russell finally managed to make it past Albon but only by somewhat cutting the chicane after the tunnel. It triggered an investigation but Russell said he was just doing to take the penalty as he was adamant Albon was driving erratically. Indeed, Russell has already noted Albon was driving "dangerously slowly, slamming the brakes everywhere".
Instead of a 5s penalty, Russell was curiously handed a drive-through penalty. Antonelli had the same issue 2 laps later and only just managed to avoid Albon by braking for the chicane. The Italian however still opted to let Albon past again since a drive-through surely wasn't a beneficial outcome.
When Russell was informed of the penalty, he replied "To be honest, I prefer not to speak". Two laps later Russell served his penalty, funnily emerging 3s ahead of Albon. However, Williams had another trick up their sleeve as at the same time they boxed Sainz, ensuring the Spaniard could stop while staying ahead of Russell with the latter still needing to stop. Sainz remaining approximately 3 seconds ahead of Russell.
Next up, Antonelli started to back up the pack behind, allowing Albon to distance himself and enabling Russell to come back out after his first regular stop in 11th place, leaving a glimmer of home for a point if at all there was be a safety car in the final 10 laps. In fact, Mercedes contiued the tactics and enabled Russell to run away again, pitting a second time on lap 71 and again emerge ahead of Antonelli. Clearly a sacrifice as this left Antonelli with two stops still to do in the 6 laps laps of the race.
As Verstappen stayed out longer, the cars behind him closed in. By lap 59, Norris and Leclerc were both following the race leader at less than 2 seconds while Piastri was also closing in, albeit still at 7 seconds.
By lap 70 the situation in front was still the same, albeit with Leclerc anxious to make it past while Norris was being held up by Verstappen. Norris also questions why Piastri wasn't closer to Leclerc as the Australian seemed to be steady at 2.5s behind Leclerc, seemingly not willing to take too much dirty air.
At the end of the penultimate lap, Verstappen finally pitted, bringing Norris in the lead, followed b Leclerc and Piatri at less than a second behind him. Verstappen returned and finished in 4th place, still comfortably ahead of Hamilton in 5th.
When released, Norris immediately upped the pace and set the fastest lap of the race in the final lap, underlining a great weekend for the Briton.
