The 2018 Championship moves on to the sixth race of the season and what is arguably the most iconic of them all – the Monaco Grand Prix.
The Circuit de Monaco has hosted Grand Prix events since 1929 is still widely considered the jewel in F1’s crown.
Together with the Indianapolis 500 and the 24 hours of Le Mans the Monaco Grand Prix forms part of the Triple Crown of Motorsport – a crown Fernando Alonso has his eye on wearing (Fernando will try to add a Le Mans win to his achievements later in 2018). To date Graham Hill is the only driver to have achieved the Triple Crown.
It is perhaps not surprising that the record for the most wins in the Principaility is held by Ayrton Senna  – his quali performances are the stuff of legend as he showed in 1988 when he beat his team mate Alain Prost by 1.5 seconds to pole.
BUT IS IT REALLY IMPOSSIBLE TO OVERTAKE AT MONACO?
The accusation always levelled at Monaco is that the races are processional, and overtaking is impossible around the narrow track. But is that really true?
We took a look back at each Grand Prix going back to 1996 to see what the stats could tell us.
Overtakes over the last 20 years clearly show that the tight circuit generally does provide significantly less total overtakes compared to the average of all circuits – but not in all years.
The anomaly in that graph is clearly the race in 2008 – which shows that a relatively high number of overtakes are possible in Monaco.
The key influence in 2008 was that the race started in wet conditions but dried during the race which resulted in different strategies and some big performance differences between the cars at various stages of the race. And the winner in 2008? Lewis Hamilton.
When it comes to the race for podium positions overtaking is extremely rare. In the past 12 years there have only been four overtakes for position in the top three. Of these four only one was a legitimate overtake:
- 2016 Hamilton over Rosberg for 2nd – team order
- 2014 Raikkonen over Vettel for 3rd – gearbox issue for Seb
- 2008 Hamilton over Raikkonen for 3rd – pitlane penalty
- 2006 Raikkonen over Webber for 2nd – A LEGITMATE overtake as Webber ran wide
HOW DOES MONACO COMPARE TO OTHER TRACKS WHEN IT COMES TO OVERTAKING?
So we know passing other cars is tricky at Monaco, but how does the track compare to other circuits on the F1 calendar for overtaking?
Direct statistical comparisons can be difficult due to certain tracks only having a handful of races (like India and Korea, for example), so this graph shows the average number of overtakes at each track over the past 20 years, and only includes circuits that have hosted 10 or more races in that period.
And it’s no real surprise to see Monaco is bottom of the rankings. The principality circuit has an average of 12 overtakes per race, compared to 32 for Spa, 34 for Interlagos and a whopping 52 for Shanghai.
So overtaking in Monte Carlo is not impossible, but it is very, very tough, which makes a genuine overtake all the more impressive when it does happen. Here’s hoping some of the drivers can pull off a few this weekend.
SO DOES THAT MEAN YOU NEED TO BE ON POLE TO WIN?
Well, not necessarily – over the past three years the winner of the Monaco GP hasn’t started from pole.
And since 1950 the grid position of winners at Monaco aren’t hugely different to other circuits.
More telling are the stats over the last 20 years:
Over the past two decades no driver has won the Monaco GP starting outside the top three on the grid.
Before the recent run of three years of non-pole winners, the previous six races were won from pole with both Nico Rosberg and Mark Webber achieving the feat twice.
WHAT HAPPENED IN LAST YEARS RACE?
- In 2017 Kimi Raikkonen started on pole – his first since the 2008 French GP
- Sebastian Vettel won from 2nd on the grid after “”over-cutting” his pole sitting team mate
- 2017 was the first win for Ferrari at Monaco since 2001 and their first 1-2 since the 2010 German GP
- After starting 5th on the grid Dan Ricciardo followed Seb’s lead staying out longer on the ultra-softs and over-cutting Verstappen and Bottas
- As you can see from the race map Lewis Hamilton had an impressive race finishing 7th after starting 13th on the grid
- There were five retirements last year including the Saubers of Werhlein and Ericsson, the Renault of Hulkenberg, and the McLarens of Vandoorne and Button.
- Button had returned to Formula 1 to keep Alonso’s seat warm while he was off competing (and also retiring) in the Indy 500. An inauspicious end to a wonderful career in F1 for Button. Rubbing salt into the wounds he scored two penalty points on his super license for causing a collision with Wehrlein.
WINNERS AND PODIUM RECORDS
As mentioned above the record for the most wins at Monaco goes to Ayrton Senna with six. Both Graham Hill and Michael Schumacher won five Monaco GP’s.
Of the current drivers to have reached the podium only Checo Perez and Dan Ricciardo haven’t stood on the top step. Having made the podium three times out of his four starts with Red Bull Ricciardo will be very keen to join his Aussie predecessor Mark Webber as a Monaco GP winner (Webber won for RBR in 2010 and 2012).
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| 1st | ||
| 2nd | Hamilton (2x) | |
| Vettel (3x) | Alonso (2x) | 3rd |
| Räikkönen (2x) | Vettel (2x) | Ricciardo (2x) |
| Hamilton (2x) | Räikkönen (1x) | Hamilton (1x) |
| Alonso (1x) | Alonso (1x) | |
| Ricciardo (1x) | Räikkönen (1x) | |
| Pérez (1x) |
