Well, well, well - where do I begin to start off with this one then - Monaco was always going to throw up some madness and delivered some mayhem in spades. Sure we have had more safety cars, and collisions on the streets before, but there was a fair few penalties dished out, some still undecided, and a red flag stoppage after some more carnage.
Out front the same story played out but there was some very fortunate developments for Vettel to maintain the domination, in terms of some pit lane confusions and and well timed crashes. Some brilliant strategic performances played out and some other drivers had a rather appalling day so here goes the review of the 2011 Monaco GP.
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| Source: F1 fanatic.co.uk |
The Race
With the grid truncated after one-stop Perez under observation in hospital things were set for an epic race on the city streets of Monaco. Off the line the front pairing made an equal launch in the short run to St Devote Vettel had an unchallenged run through the first corner, Fernando replicated his outstanding start from Spain and caught Webber and came close to Button but had to lift to avoid contact. Further back Grandpa Schumacher's car dipped into anti-stall mode and he got a really slow start dropping several places with Hamilton-grumpy face sneaking in front but took some light contact from the German.
Everyone settled into to their respective positions through the first few corners remaining single file after the re-arranging around Schumacher at the start. But Michael was the first to make a lunge - recovering one of the positions he had lost off the line, he threw the Mercedes down the inside of Hamilton grumpy face into Loews and Lewis conceded the position to avoid contact. He was saving up the violence for later...
This early phase of the race broke down into three main groups with both Mercedes cars accumulating their own personal crowd of drivers behind them. The top four had some space as they started ahead of Schumacher and were unaffected by the shuffling of postion. Rosberg was in 5th and his collection of followers included Massa, Maldonado and Petrov - who would turn out to be a an ill-fated group of drivers. The third pack was headed by Grandpa Schumacher who was plodding along like a pensioner on a motorway, backing up an increasingly angry Hamilton into Barrichello and Kobayashi with Force India not too far behind.
Both second place cars in the second two groups were looking at every possible gap to escape their Mercedes roadblocks - Hamilton was first to break the oppression diving past Michael into turn one in a display that DRS might just have a purpose. Rubens was next in line to have a go at his former teammate and not exactly best friend pulling a pass out of nowhere into Mirabeau. He would have been rather pleased to put one over on his former oppressor at Ferrari.
With clear air in front of him Hamilton easily closed up to the back of the next Mercedes led train queuing behind Petrov. Massa at the front of the chasing line behind Rosberg got a good run out of Nouvelle Chicane and passed the German into Tabac - Maldonado saw the opening and also worked his was past into the entry to the swimming pool. Putting Vitaly and Hamilton trapped behind Nico before the first round of stops commenced
It was time for the lead group of cars to make their stops - Vettel turned up to his stall to find 6 tyres waiting for him after the team misread a call and brought out the option tyres but ended up putting the prime tyres on the car with only two of the right wheels ready. Then Webber filed in to find no tyres because the primes that were ordered went to Vettel and they hadn't prepared Marks tyres at all. But that paled in comparison to Hamilton's stop when he turned up there were no mechanics never mind tyres as the team buzzed around carrying tyres to get some rubber on the car.
On the track things were also getting more animated - Paul Di Resta was opening his parts account on an attack on STR's Alguersuari. Trying to lever the Torro Rosso off the racing line in the Loews Hairpin with his front wing earning himself a drive through penalty, and ruining his front wing in the process and shedding other aero parts. After this bought of contact things began to settle down while drivers caught up behind cars on differing strategies with Rubens running up in 7th ahead of Hamilton and Massa. The first retirement of the race fell to Timo Glock in the virgin after running over the chicane a couple of time - the repeated shortcut damaged the suspension which failed on the exit of Tabac, Button fearing a safety car intervention made for pit lane but no intervention appeared.
Civility was short lived and step forward the getting even grumpier Lewis Hamilton who had latched onto the back of Massa who in turn was behind Webber and Maldonado in a slow moving queue. Lewis had grown sick of being trapped behind other cars and Massa was to bear the brunt the Lewis' violence - receiving a Di Resta type shove in the loews hairpin. Which according to Lewis couldn't have possibly been his fault - but he wasn't done with the Ferrari quite yet - deciding the tunnel is the perfect place to make a pass. This effort forced Massa onto the marbles in the tunnel which had only one inevitable conclusion - straight into the wall, bringing out the first safety car of the season.
Bernd Maylander brought the SLS out for it's first laps while Massa's car was carried off and several drivers dove to pit lane some for their only visit in the opportune time of the caution period. Sutil and Kobayashi made the biggest gain under the yellow re-appearing in 4th and 5th without needing to pit again just in front of Mark Webber in 6th. Schumacher tried to bring his car in but suffered a fire in the airbox bringing the Mercedes to a halt just on the entry to pit lane his day was done.
On the restart Vettel got a good jump on Alonso in 2rd with Button a little further down in 3rd, behind them was a series of lapped cars between Button and Sutil in 4th with a queue building behind them. Grumpier face Hamilton was issued with a deserved drive through penalty for his robust assault of the Massa in loews, and trundled down the pit lane dropping down to ninth behind Petrov and Barrichello.
An interesting development was occurring out front Vettel had a decent lead but was on the same set of tyres he received on lap 17 so was losing time to Alonso who in turn was losing time to Button in 3rd who had lost the early lead as as result of the SC intervention. Over a series of laps all three of the top contenders had drafted up to behind each other, to a point when all three were within a single second. This became increasingly complex when the lead trio were catching cars to lap.
A monolithic train was accumulating behind Sutil - including both lead lap and lapped cars stretching from 4th to 12th bunched up by the full course yellow. Kamui was the first bottled up behind the force India and had enough of being stuck behind the orange car and got all crossed up into Mirabeau making light contact with Adrian easing him wide and claiming the position - followed within the lap but out of camera view by webber. This dropped Sutil in front of Maldonado, Petrov and a rather angry Hamilton, followed by both STR cars and Nico.
That angry swarm of cars was being caught by the lead trio and just as Vettel came into view of the last car in the train Rosberg spied the leaders and allowed them through in the first part of the tunnel. At the other end of the train they lined up two by two into tabac, Maldonado inside Sutil and grumpy face Hamilton inside Petrov. On the exit of the corner Sutil hit the barrier with the rear causing a puncture placing a limping car ahead of 7 charging vehicles into the swimming pool - Hamilton backed off to avoid Sutil but Algersuari didn't and went over the top of Lewis. Petrov dodged to the outside of the Torro Rosso but Jaimie was going into the wall and Vitaly was coming with him clattering into the outside armco.
Welcome back onto the track the safety car - again - but not for long as it transpired what initially appeared as a general collision has caused some pain for Petrov in his ankle after the impact. This resulted in a longer extraction time for Vitaly so the officials threw the red flag to get the ambulance on track for a precautionary run to the hospital.
Under the red, it appeared the teams could replace the tyres, the circles of rubber which was making the battle for the field so interesting. But a reset on the wheels neutralised that battle and consigned the race to a forgone conclusion where no change would take effect on the restart, McLaren were also hurriedly working on Lewis rear wing after alguersuari ran over it en route to the wall.
The green waved with 5 laps to go and the top three once again split from everyone else by some lapped cars and on equal tyres were locked into position. Further back Grumpy Hamilton determined he hadn't finished being a prat and nerfed Maldonado into the barrier at St Devote on the restart, which along with everything else this season wasn't his fault....The only other change for position was Webber on Kobayashi down into Nouvelle chicane which corrected the early damage done by the poor pit visit moving him back up to the place he occupied in turn one lap one.
After a race of madness, grumpy driving, safety cars and a red flag - Vettel remains on the top step of the podium gifted the win through an accidental tyre stop and very convenient saftety car interventions scuppered the strategy of Button. With Alonso and Button rounding off the top three.
The Bonus Points Championship points winners
In amongst the carnage, collisions and interventions points are about to be awarded to those who succeeded in the melee.
10pts - Kobayashi: For making a great strategy work from outside the top ten to 5th, the best of the drivers outside the top three teams
8pts - Sutil: The other driver on the great strategy and still scored points desite a puncture causing the red flag crash
6pts - Maldonado: For a very strong performance showing his Monaco speciality until being binned by Lewis
5pts - Button: If it wasn't for some unfortunate strategy he would have been the first car to beat Red Bull during the race instead of a tyre effected final stint
4pts - Alonso: A well crafted race and another very strong start
3pts - Red Bull: For throwing a hilarious party and putting Eddie Jordan in the pool several times after the race, and also dunking D.C.
2pts - Vettel: For being the luckiest driver today catching all the breaks and holding off Alonso before the race suspension
1pt - Monaco - For providing the maddest race of the season - Canada beat that!
The Also Official Penalties Championship
With madness and contact brings with it penalties and punishments and here were this weeks offenders.
Paul Di Resta: Drive through, attacking alguersuari
Lewis Hamilton: Drive through, attacking Massa
Lewis Hamilton (again): 20 time penalty - attacking Massa
No official penalty was handed to Kobayashi for the contact on Sutil but was told off and don't do it again
The No Less Official Dodgy Dealings Championship
Well aside from the punishments the race stewards dished out there were those other moments that deserve penalty points
Lewis Hamilton: For being a moron and deciding that everything is someone else's fault and how now the FIA also dislike him apparently be cause he is black in the words of some guy called Ali G whoever one of them is. On top of that a second penalty point for effectively putting Massa into the wall in the tunnel, passing through there is idiotic and a wreck was inevitable.
The Regulations: For allowing tyres to be changed under red flag conditions, it should be parc ferme conditions allowing for force majure to deal with damage or weather related issues. It compromised a great fight for the lead in the final three laps.
Looking to Canada
With a two week gap between one crazy race and a circuit which also is usually filled with some more insanity immense tyre wear and probably a safety car or two. It will be very interesting how the Pirellis cope in Montreal as they were designed to create the madness of Canada everywhere else - how are they going to perform there?
The gap will give Hamilton Grumpiest face to realise his moronic outburst and make up for it, the rest of the grid came awfully close to beating Vettel in Monaco - only saved by some luck and the accidents, will Canada see a change at the top of the grid. Will that unassailable lead in the regular championship which is not really recognised here be cut down across the pond.
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