Vettel takes Ferrari back to victory in Monaco

Sebastian Vettel has achieved his third victory this season in the Monaco Grand Prix, after overtaking Räikkönen, who has completed the Ferrari one-two. Ricciardo has completed the podium thanks to the strategy.

The famous Grand Prix of Monaco has had a race with strategy, tension, accidents but without many overtakes on track.

Quiet start

Kimi Räikkönen started from pole position and managed to maintain the top spot ahead of Sebastian Vettel and Valtteri Bottas, who almost beat the German. Behind him, Kevin Magnussen did a surprisingly good start, moving up to the eighth place by beating Hulkenberg and Kvyat, while Hamilton outplayed Vandoorne.

The race was quite calm with no overtaking. The first notable incident involved Hulkenberg gearbox’s failure, making him abandon the race.

Vettel and Ricciardo surpass their rivals

By lap 26, the distances in the lead were reduced and Vettel managed to catch his teammate but could not overtake him.

Max Verstappen (Red Bull) was in the same situation with Valtteri Bottas (Mercedes) in the fight for the third position. The Dutch decided to pit on lap 32 to try to overtake him but Mercedes reacted quickly and managed to keep Bottas ahead of Verstappen.

But Daniel Ricciardo (Red Bull), who was riding behind both drivers, decided to remain on track for 6 more laps, long enough to beat Bottas and Verstappen for a third place finish.

A similar situation happened between the two Ferrari. The Italian team made Raikkonen pit first. He would lose time overtaking the lapped drivers, allowing Vettel to surpass the Finn for the final victory.

Carlos Sainz (Toro Rosso) finished in the sixth position after a very good performance. The Spaniard managed to keep Lewis Hamilton behind until the end of the race, whose strategy had allowed him to overtake Romain Grosjean (Haas) for the seventh place.

The points, a 5-way fight

The final points have been fought by Sergio Pérez (Force India), Stoffel Vandoorne (McLaren-Honda), Kevin Magnussen (Haas), Daniil Kvyat (Toro Rosso) and Felipe Massa (Williams).

Perez was facing what it seemed an “easy” race but a couple of incidents were fatal for him. A broken front wing made him pit sooner than expected, losing a lot of time on the track. In addition, an accident with Daniil Kvyat forced him to enter the pits for the second time. Thus, he finished last but he obtained the circuit’s lap record, which had been Michael Schumacher’s  since 2004. The Mexican accomplished a 1:14.820.

It also looked like Magnussen would easily score points. After a great start, the Danish driver lost many chances to enter the top ten with two pit stops, but Perez‘s mistakes and Vandoorne‘s DNF allowed hium to finish tenth.

Felipe Massa achieved a surprising ninth position, also benefiting from Vandoorne’s and Perez’s misfortunes.

The silent fight: Wehrlein vs Button and an unhappy end

The main battle far from the points has been that between Pascal Wehrlein (Sauber) and Jenson Button (McLaren-Honda). Both drivers opted for a very aggressive strategy by stopping in the first lap. However, they made an extra pit stop and, finally, they both crashed in Pourtier. The Safety Car was deployed and they were forced to abandon the race.

The accident left the German’s car upside down. However, the driver left the crash safe and sound.

Vettel and Ferrari confirm expectations

Sebastian Vettel finally got the third victory of the season and the first of Ferrari in Monaco since 2001. Perfect day for Ferrari with Räikkönen second, getting the 90th one-two of the team in Formula 1.

Thanks to the victory, Vettel leads the championship with 129 points, 25 more than Hamilton. Bottas is third with 54 points.

Results:

* Provisional results