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Formula 1 Racing comments (1 viewing) (1) Guest
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Topic History of: Hamilton wins chaotic Monaco GP
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** This thread discusses the Content article: Hamilton wins chaotic Monaco GP **
<img src="images/stories/basic/monaco.jpg" border="0" alt="monaco" title="monaco" hspace="5" vspace="5" width="110" height="73" align="left" />A disappointing Monte Carlo Grand Prix for Kimi Raikkonen found him crashing into Sutil a few laps before the end of the race while in 5th place. It was the end of a mediocre race for Kimi but a thrilling wet-dry race for F1 fans.<br />
<br />
Lewis Hamilton took his maiden Monaco win, while Robert Kubica finished second and Felipe Massa third. <br />
It duly rained before the start of the race, but after six laps Hamilton
walloped the wall hard on the exit to the Swimming Pool, while trailing
poleman Felipe Massa’s Ferrari. Into the pits he came, and at that
stage the race seemed to belong to the Brazilian.<br />
<br />
McLaren,
however, brimmed the MP4-23 with fuel, and Hamilton caught his first
break when the safety car was deployed on the eighth lap after Red
Bull’s David Coulthard and Toro Rosso’s Sebastien Bourdais went off at
Massenet. <br />
<br />
The racing resumed on the 11th lap, and two laps
later Kimi Raikkonen dropped out of second place when he had to serve a
drive-through penalty for having his tyres fitted too late in the grid.
Now BMW Sauber’s Robert Kubica moved up to push Massa, and was able to
snatch the lead when the latter slid momentarily up the escape road at
Ste Devote on the 16th lap. Hamilton was chasing hard after them, with
Raikkonen now trailing in fourth place.<br />
<br />
Kubica stayed ahead
until he refuelled on the 26th lap, whereupon Massa went back into the
lead until his stop on the 33rd lap. By then Hamilton was up to second,
and after moving into the lead… he just kept going.<br />
<br />
He did not
have to refuel until the 54th lap, and that lengthy stint proved
absolutely crucial. Kubica had already stopped for the second time a
lap earlier, so was no further threat, and having built a lead of 37.6s
Hamilton could refuel, switch to Bridgestone’s soft tyres, and resume
still in the lead.<br />
<br />
Still he was not home and dry, however. He
was 40 seconds ahead when Nico Rosberg, running a lap down after two
pits stops to replace damaged noses, tanked his Williams hard into the
walls on the exit to the Swimming Pool on the 61st lap. Out came the
safety car again, and suddenly Hamilton’s huge advantage had been
eroded completely. He kept his head when the race restarted on the 68th
lap, however, and was able to pull away to what he described as “a very
emotional triumph. The highlight of my career.”<br />
<br />
Behind him, Kubica had no trouble fending off Massa for second for BMW Sauber.<br />
<br />
Adrian
Sutil could have finished fourth for Force India having driven a superb race with a heavy fuel load. But he was the
biggest loser in the second safety-car incident. He had been
comfortably ahead of Raikkonen’s Ferrari when Rosberg crashed, and was
later assaulted by the red car going into the chicane as the race
resumed. Raikkonen had got into the same sort of tank-slapper as David
Coulthard did in qualifying, and though the Finn kept control of his
car he smacked hard enough into the back of Sutil’s car to remove his
own front wing and put the unfortunate German out of the greatest race
of his life.<br />
<br />
As Raikkonen fell back, Mark Webber finished fourth
for Red Bull ahead of Sebastian Vettel, who finally got a break to
bring his new Toro Rosso STR3 home fifth in front of Rubens
Barrichello’s Honda, Kazuki Nakajima’s Williams and Heikki Kovalainen,
all of whom fought throughout. The McLaren driver had to start from the
pit lane after his MP4-23 stalled on the grid, and scooped the final
point by keeping Raikkonen at bay to the flag, which fell two laps
sooner than scheduled as the race reached the two-hour mark.<br />
<br />
Behind
Raikkonen, Fernando Alonso was 10th for Renault after a series of
collisions, then came Jenson Button, who lost his Honda’s front wing on
the opening lap in a brush with Nick Heidfeld, the Toyotas of
thrice-spinning Timo Glock and Jarno Trulli, and Heidfeld himself, who
was assaulted by Alonso in a brush at the Lowes hairpin.<br />
<br />
Besides
Sutil, Rosberg, Coulthard and Bourdais, Nelson Piquet dropped out of a
tough fight with Vettel after brushing a wall, and Giancarlo
Fisichella’s 200th race ended in retirement too.
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