The F1 Monaco GP was the usual procession considering the track layout but Mercedes continued its winning ways with Lewis Hamilton doing the job.
The qualifying turned out to be frantic especially for Ferrari, who barely got through Q2 on Sebastian Vettel’s side but he sadly bumped out teammate Charles Leclerc as Hamilton took pole ahead of Valtteri Bottas and Red Bull Racing’s Max Verstappen.
The race start worked in favour of Hamilton as he stayed ahead of a fighting Bottas and Verstappen with the Finn remaining in front still but at the back of it, in his attempt to break through the field, Leclerc collided with Renault’s Nico Hulkenberg.
It resulted in a safety car and twisted the grand prix a bit as Hamilton still led but on the medium compound to the hard for Verstappen, Vettel and Bottas. The British saw-through the challenge still to score the win as Verstappen finished second on the road.
A penalty meant he dropped to fourth ahead of teammate Pierre Gasly, as Vettel and Bottas completed the podium. McLaren’s Carlos Sainz was best of the rest from Toro Rosso’s Daniil Kvyat and Alexander Albon as strategy worked in favour of them.
Here’s some key statistics and information from the Monaco GP weekend:
- Hamilton scored his 77th career win, 56th for Mercedes. It was only his third Monaco GP win as he joins Nico Rosberg, Stirling Moss and Jackie Stewart in the three win club.
- Mercedes scored its 93rd win, eighth in Monaco to go one better than Lotus and be third in the all-time list with Ferrari ahead with 10 wins. The streak of 1-2 finishes ended in Monaco with the record set as five grand prix.
- Hamilton inched closer to Ayrton Senna in the every lap led list with the British racer having 17 now to 19 for the Brazilian.
- Hamilton scored his 140th F1 podium with Vettel his 114th and Bottas’ 36th.
- Hamilton took his 85th career pole as Gasly got his second fastest lap of 2019 and his best result for Red Bull in fifth. It was also Hamilton’s 48th career win from pole.
- Monaco was Bottas’ 18th consecutive points finish since 2017 British GP as he equaled his previous own record. Hamilton has also 18th consecutive points finishes since the same grand prix but he himself holds the record of 33 consecutive points finishes.
- It was the first time that Leclerc failed to make Q3 for Ferrari after dropping out in Q1. He was the only one retirement from the race as well.
- Sainz had his best result for McLaren in sixth and continued his streak of points finish in Monaco since 2015. He jumped four places in the drivers’ championship, moving from 11th to seventh.
- It was Toro Rosso’s first double points finish for Toro Rosso in 2019 and first since 2017 Spanish GP. Both Kvyat and Albon registered their result in 2019 and for the team personally in seventh and eighth respectively.
- It was the first time for all four Honda cars to score points. The last time when they had four cars in points was in 1987 British GP – when they had two teams like now.
- Even though Verstappen dropped to fourth but his streak of not finishing below the Top 5 continues on since the 2018 Hungarian GP.
- With Antonio Giovinazzi in 19th due to penalty, he is the first driver in 2019 to finish a race behind a Williams – he ended behind both the Williams, in fact.
- For Williams, they registered their best result of 2019 with George Russell in 15th as he managed to beat both the Alfa Romeo Racing cars along with a Racing Point.
- In terms of points finishes, it is only Mercedes left to have scored in all the six races. And in terms of race finishes, only Mercedes, Alfa Romeo and Williams have 100 percent finishing record in 2019 after Ferrari’s drop-out.
- Kimi Raikkonen had his 300th grand prix week as he became the fifth driver to join the 300 club. His 300th race start though will take place in 2019 Austrian GP.
- Six drivers were given a total of nine penalty points in Monaco. Three were given to Giovinazzi for two separate incidents, two to Verstappen and one each to Lance Stroll, Romain Grosjean, Gasly and Kevin Magnussen. Stroll is closest in terms of a race ban with eight points against his name.
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The stats were compiled by Jack Elleker and Darshan Chokhani
Spanish GP: Key statistics and information from 2019 F1 race