Categories: FeatureFeatures

Monaco Grand Prix review

In a principality famed for its casino, the Monaco Grand Prix had a late twist in the tale as Mercedes rolled the dice with race-winner elect Lewis Hamilton and saw the gamble backfire. F1i looks back at how the race weekend unfolded and opens itself up to future ridicule by checking just how accurate its podium prediction was…

The race in 100 words

Hamilton had the race all sewn up after a dominant performance from pole position while Nico Rosberg spent the race fending off the attentions of Sebastian Vettel. However, a heavy crash for Max Verstappen at Ste Devote saw the safety car deployed and Mercedes opted to pit Hamilton, misjudging the gap and dropping the championship leader to third place. Rosberg went on to win from Vettel and Hamilton, while Daniel Ricciardo barged his way ahead of Kimi Raikkonen to take fifth behind team-mate Daniil Kvyat. McLaren also scored its first points of 2015 as Jenson Button came home eighth.

Driver of the weekend

It’s going to Hamilton this weekend, who didn’t put a foot wrong in qualifying to take his first pole position in Monaco and was then in dominant form before Mercedes’ pit stop error. Hamilton can’t be 100% blameless in the decision to pit, and once third he seemed to give up hope of winning the race on track, but he was faultless until that point and realistically should never have seen his victory jeopardised.

Move of the race

Even for Monaco, there were a few standout moves and most of them came from Max Verstappen. While his race ultimately ended in a major accident following contact with Romain Grosjean, Verstappen had previously jumped Valtteri Bottas by following closely behind Vettel as he put a lap on the Williams. His best move, however, came on Pastor Maldonado in to Ste Devote, outbraking the Lotus in to the first corner and then running side-by-side despite the limited space. Verstappen moved ahead on the run up to Casino Square in what was an excellent piece of driving from both drivers.

Prediction accuracy

Podium: 1. Nico Rosberg, 2. Sebastian Vettel, 3. Lewis Hamilton

F1i’s pre-race prediction: 1. Nico Rosberg, 2. Sebastian Vettel, 3. Kimi Raikkonen

Weekend recap

Thursday

Hamilton tops rain-interrupted FP2 in Monaco

Gallery

Saturday

Hamilton storms to Monaco pole after Rosberg error

Gallery

Sunday

Rosberg wins after Mercedes throws away Hamilton victory

Gallery

Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.