Partly rained out GP
Max Verstappen has won the Monaco Grand Prix for the second time. The 25-year-old Dutchman led from start to finish in his hometown. Spaniard Fernando Alonso (Aston Martin) finished second, Frenchman Esteban Ocon (Alpine) took third place. Nyck de Vries finished outside the points in twelfth place.
Verstappen won four of the six grands prix this season and is now firmly at the top of the World Cup standings. The Red Bull leader increased his lead over teammate Sergio Pérez from 14 to 39 points. The Mexican crashed at the start of qualifying on Saturday and was therefore almost without a chance for points. Overtaking is virtually impossible in the narrow streets of Monaco and Pérez was unable to get close to the top 10. The Mexican damaged his car while trying to overtake, made no less than five pit stops and finished in sixteenth place.
The GP of Monaco had a chaotic final phase. More than twenty laps before the end it started to rain, which led to a lot of pit stops, slides and collisions. Verstappen made no mistakes and triumphed in the principality, just like in 2021.
The Dutchman had conquered pole position for the first time in Monaco on Saturday. He thus more or less laid the foundation for the race on the street circuit. Verstappen got off to a good start, was the first to enter the first corner and then drove unthreatened to victory.
The Red Bull driver started on the medium tyres, while Alonso – who had qualified second – had the hard tires put on his Aston Martin. In principle, the Spaniard was able to drive longer than the Dutchman, who started complaining about his deteriorating tires halfway through the race on the on-board radio. However, the team management advised him to continue, because he would lose the lead to Alonso at a pit stop.
When it started to rain harder in Monaco after about fifty laps, Aston Martin made a wrong guess by sending Alonso out again with medium tires at a pit stop. However, there was so much water on the track that the so-called intermediates (tyres with grooves for the rain) proved necessary. Verstappen went in for intermediates one lap later, followed by Alonso who made his second pit stop. With a comfortable lead of about 25 seconds, the Dutchman completed the last twenty laps smoothly.
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– Thanks for information from Autoweek.nl