Pole: Charles Leclerc
Winner: Sergio Perez
Fastest Lap: Lando Norris 1.14.693
Race:
Delayed start due to the weather conditions and the change of tyres. The rain seems fairly calm and does not seem as though it needs full wet tyres and the safety car formation lap.
The race was delayed for at least 16 minutes.
Race 10 minutes warning at 15:55 (Monaco time)
Race to resume at 16:05 local time.
1-10
Lap 2 Latifi hits the wall but gets going again. Stroll also scraped the wall and gets a right rear puncture. Rolling start from lap 2. Lap 3 Gasly pits for intermediates. All drivers seem to be following each other as we’re told there’s no rain for the next 20-30 minutes. Lap 6 Pierre Gasly sets the fastest lap on the intermediates. Ocon overtook Vettel for 9th but we did not get to see it. Lap 7 Tsunoda and Vettel pit for intermediates. Lap 9 Russell trying to overtake Norris coming out of the tunnel but overshoots it, misses the chicane, and backs out of it.
10-20
Lap 12 Gasly overtakes Zhou to take p13. At the second to last corner, he tries to overtake Ricciardo for p12 but Ricciardo keeps it. There seems to be a racing line being dried and drivers should now be coming in for intermediates. Lap 14 Gasly overtakes around the swimming pool to take p12. Leclerc leading comfortably with a 4-second gap to his teammate Sainz. Lap 16 Hamilton pits for intermediates. Lap 17 Perez pits for intermediates. Lap 18 Norris pits for intermediates to try and cover Hamilton coming through the pack. Leclerc and Verstappen put on lap 18 for intermediates but Sainz stayed out to try and go straight onto full slicks.
20-30
Albon and Schumacher on hard compound tyres. Hamilton closing on Ocon into turn 1. They are battling it out for the next 2 laps but Hamilton can’t seem to find a way around it. Ferrari double-stacked but Leclerc dramatically loses the lead after a late call from the team telling Leclerc to stay out. The red bulls now leading 1-2. Both red bulls overtake the Ferraris and keep the lead. Lap 23 Hamilton pits for hard tyres. Lap 25 Russell has cleared Norris during the rush of pit stops. Lap 26 and both Mercedes are flying. Lap 27 Schumacher is in the wall after the swimming pool and the HAAS looks very badly damaged. Lap 28 safety car deployed. Both cars for the HAAS team are out with Magnussen having to retire his car just before the incident.
30-40
Red flag for the race to fix the barriers. Race resume at 17:15 local time and it will be a rolling start. Lap 33 and Perez locks up on the first lap but still leads the race. Hamilton is now following Alonso very closely running in p7 and p8. Lap 36 and the hard compound tyres seem to be firing up better than the mediums.
35mins
Sainz looking very quick running in p2. Verstappen and Leclerc running 3rd and 4th. Russell and Norris still running solid races in 5th and 6th. 31 minutes left and DRS is enabled which can only be used on the main straight. Alonso is creating a huge train behind him in p7. 5 minutes to go and the top 4 are all battling each other and are following each other closely. Perez is struggling with his tyres towards the end of this race. Ocon has a 5-second penalty for the collision with Hamilton earlier on which may drop him out of the points as Alonso holding up the pack earlier on has cost him.
3 minutes to go and Perez is managing his tyres really well. The top 4 all follow within a second of each other they are continuing to follow closely throughout the remaining laps of the race.
Perez wins the Monaco Grand Prix, Sainz in second closely followed by Verstappen. Russell maintains his top 5 finishes in p5 closely followed by Norris in p6.
Summary:
Round 7 of the 2022 Formula 1 world championship took us to Monaco's historic and iconic circuit. Rainy conditions meant that there was a delayed start to the race by almost half an hour, the race eventually resumed at 16:05 local time.
The Monaco Grand Prix was filled with plenty of action as we saw some heart-in-mouth saves from both Sainz and Zhou with them both losing the rear ends of their cars. Ferrari made a questionable call with the hometown hero Charles Leclerc as he receives a late call to come into the pits following his teammate Sainz which ended in Leclerc losing the lead of the race. George Russell was best of the rest in p5 followed by Lando Norris in p6. Gasly had a decent outing after starting p17 he was able to make up 5 positions finishing just out of the points in p12. Meanwhile, closer to the back end of the field, HAAS had a miserable day in Monaco as neither car finished the race with Schumacher crashing mid-race and Magnussen retiring with a system water pressure loss.
Next, the Formula 1 grid will return to the streets of Baku, Azerbaijan with the hopes of more fantastic and competitive racing.
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