FORMULA ONE: Max Verstappen won his second Monaco Grand Prix yesterday (May 28) after an Aston Martin tactical misstep in a late rain shower handed him a comfortable lead.
Max Verstappen in rainy conditions at the Monaco Grand Prix yesterday (May 28). Photo: AFP
Verstappen started from pole position alongside Fernando Alonso and held the lead off the line with a perfect start, but the pair differed in their choice of tyre for the opening stint of the race.
The Dutchman had selected the faster but more fragile medium compound, while Alonso had gambled on the more durable hard rubber.
Alonso hoped being able to run longer into the race than Verstappen without changing tyres would open the door to a safety car or late rain gifting him a cheap pit stop that might catapult him into the lead.
As luck would have it, rain appeared with 25 of 78 lap remaining.
But Aston Martin hesitated to take advantage of the opportunity. Its radar suggested the rain would be light and brief, and Alonso reported the track wasn’t yet wet enough for wet-weather tyres.
On lap 54 he pitted for another set of dry-weather slicks, but as soon as he rejoined the track he realised he’d made a mistake.
The rain was coming down heavier, and the Spaniard was forced to slip and slide his way back to pit lane for a second tyre change.
Verstappen had retained the lead throughout and switched directly to intermediates, in doing so extending what had been an eight-second lead into more than 20 seconds.
It wasn’t all smooth sailing from there for the Dutchman. His Red Bull Racing car was a handful on the treacherous track surface, and more than once Verstappen clattered into the walls, though fortunately never with enough force to cause him any serious damage.
Regaining his composure, he galloped to 27-second victory.
“It was quite hectic towards the end,” Verstappen said. “I clipped a few barriers, especially on my in-lap. It was very, very difficult.
“The hard bit is that you have a good lead but of course you don’t want to risk too much – but also you don’t want to drive too slow, because then you have no temperature in your tyres.
“Just trying to find a bit the middle ground initially was a bit tough, but then after a few laps I think I settled in and felt quite comfortable.”
With teammate Sergio Pérez finishing 16th after starting last, Verstappen has grown his title lead to 39 points.
Alonso appeared relaxed about second place despite the apparent missed shot at victory, noting that it was his highest finish for the season.
“I’m very happy,” he said. “I think the race was not easy to execute.
“When the rain came it made things a little bit difficult for everybody, especially when you are on a podium place – you don’t want anything strange to happen, any chaos.
“I have been few times third this year; today second, so we only miss that one step.”
Esteban Ocon completed the podium for an excellent third for Alpine, though he was fortunate big strategy gambles by two key rivals didn’t pay off.
Both teammate Pierre Gasly and Mercedes driver George Russell started on the hard tyre and hadn’t made their pit stops when the rain arrived, putting them in the frame to jump Ocon.
But Gasly fell into the Alonso trap of taking on slick tyres before realising the track was too wet, and while Russell made the right call by going straight to wet-weather tyres, he locked up on his out-lap and dropped a pair of positions, handing Ocon the place.
“I’m speechless at the moment,” he said. “I’m a little bit on my cloud still.
“Before the weekend, if you told us that we are going to be in the top 10, we would have been happy. It would have been a strong weekend.
“But we are not in the top 10, we are not in the top five, we are on the podium this weekend here in Monaco. That shows really that never stopped believing.”
Lewis Hamilton inherited fourth behind Ocon after Carlos Sainz had his strategy bungled by Ferrari.
Despite also starting on the hard tyre with an opportunity to run deep into he race, the Italian team stopped the Spaniard early in a defensive move to keep Hamilton at bay. It worked, but Sainz was so frustrated the team took its eyes off ways to get past Ocon that he slid off the road in wet conditions and fell to eighth.
Russell finished fifth ahead of Charles Leclerc, Gasly and Sainz.
McLaren teammates Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri scored the final points of the day from ninth and 10th after getting past a bitterly disappointed Yuki Tsunoda, whose disciplined defence of ninth was undone by brake problems.
