Sergio Perez secured his third Formula One victory at a rain-hit Monaco Grand Prix after retaining a late charge from Carlos Sainz.
The last laps of the race featured the first four riders – Perez, Sainz, Max Verstappen and Charles Leclerc – covered by a handful of seconds with Perez under immense pressure from Sainz who was looking for his first victory in the race. F1 Grand Prix.
Sainz took a couple of half-looks at the Nouvelle Chicane, but could not prevent Perez from securing his first victory since winning the Azerbaijani GP last year.
Perez took third place in the first stages of the grand prix which did not start until an hour later than expected after it started to rain.
After the race finally began, Leclerc led his Ferrari teammate Sainz, Pérez and Verstappen, who has been firmly the second best Red Bull this weekend.
Perez was the first of the leaders to pull the trigger and go from full snow to intermediate on lap 16, about 14 laps later than the first riders to make the switch.
Leclerc and Verstappen faced off two laps later, but both came out behind Pérez, while Sainz canceled his team’s initial request to pit him shortly after Pérez.
Instead, Sainz went straight from wet tires to slicks three laps later and Ferrari decided to double-stack Leclerc at the same time, a decision he tried to reverse too late, radioing Leclerc as he headed for the pitlane.
Verstappen pitted a lap later and managed to jump to Leclerc for third place behind Sainz and new race leader Perez.
Just as the new leadership order was established, Mick Schumacher lost control of his Haas in the pool section and caused a red flag period.
When the race resumed, the Red Bulls used new means, while the Ferraris in second and fourth opted for used hard tires, creating this tense four-way fight in the final laps.
Pérez clung to the victory ahead of Sainz and Verstappen, who completed the podium and extended their lead in the championship by three more points with a discouraged Leclerc in fourth place.
Leclerc expressed his frustration with Ferrari’s strategy on the team’s radio while continuing his unfortunate record at home, even though he is finishing a race in Monaco for the first time in his career.
“No words, no words, we can’t do that,” Leclerc told his team after the race.
George Russell followed Sainz by switching directly to the slicks from the wet and was able to jump to Lando Norris to take fifth place.
Norris, who is recovering from tonsillitis, took sixth place in McLaren ahead of Fernando Alonso (Alpine).
Lewis Hamilton spent most of the race looking at the back of an Alpine. First, it was Esteban Ocon’s Alpine with whom he collided with Ste Devote.
Hamilton received wing damage that his Mercedes team was able to repair during the red flag period, while Ocon received a five-second penalty for causing the collision.
After the red flag, Hamilton was trapped behind Alonso and had to settle for eighth place ahead of Valtteri Bottas, who moved from 12th on the grid to ninth.
The Ocon penalty put Bottas in ninth place and gave Sebastian Vettel the final spot in 10th place for Aston Martin.
AlphaTauri’s Pierre Gasly looked for points from 17th on the grid after a strong start to the intermittent pace, but eventually finished 12th, behind Ocon and ahead of Daniel Ricciardo and Lance Stroll.
Along with Schumacher, his teammate Kevin Magnussen and Alexander Albon were the retirees.
Race results
Pos Name Car Laps Laps Led Total time Faster lap Pits 1 Sergio Pérez Red Bull 64 44 1h56m30.265s 1m16.028s 3 25 2 Carlos Sainz Jr. Ferrari 64 3 + 1.154s 1m16.421s 3 Max Versta47n 1 Red Bull 2 Versta47n 1 + 1.491s 1m16.052s 3 15 4 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 64 0 + 2.922s 1m16.249s 3 12 5 George Russell Mercedes 64 0 +11.968 s 1m16.83s 2 10 6 Lando Norris 1m16.249m 1m16.24m 1m16.83m 1m16.83m 4 9 7 Fernando Alonso Alpine-Renault 64 0 + 46.358s 1m15.882s 2 6 8 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 64 0 + 50.388s 1m17. 203s 3 4 9 Valtteri Bottas Alfa Romeo-Ferrari 64 0 + 52.512.6s 1m17.203s Sebastian Vettel Aston Martin-Mercedes 64 0 + 53.536s 1m17.558s 3 1 11 Pierre Gasly AlphaTauri-Red Bull 64 0 + 54.289s 1m17.344s 3 0 12 Esteban Ocon Alpine-Renault 64.617.5551.615.551.615. Daniel Ricciardo McLaren-Mercedes 64 0 + 57.635s 1m17.532s 2 0 14 Lance Stroll Aston Martin-Mercedes 64 0 + 1m0.802s 1m17.672s 4 0 15 Nicholas Latifi Williams-Mercedes-Mercedes 18657 0 +1 1865 7 Guanyu Zhou Alfa Romeo-Ferrari 6 3 0 +1 lap 1m18.2s 2 0 17 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri-Red Bull 63 0 +1 lap 1m15.334s 4 0 Alex Albon Williams-Mercedes 48 0 DNF 1m18.023s 4 0 Mick Schumacher 21-18.023s 4 0 Mick Schumacher Haasm 21. 778s 2 0 Kevin Magnussen Haas-Ferrari 24 0 DNF 1m33.754s 1 0
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