The first few corners would be crucial as well. In F2 and the Porsche Supercup races earlier in the day, there were big crashes. In F2, there was an 11 car pile up (which was not replayed despite no one being hurt) and the Porsche that spun meant all the cars behind them had to stop, like a massive Monegasque traffic jam.
Everyone was away clearly and in grid order, at the end of the first lap though, Bortoleto was into the wall, as he was caught out by Antonelli overtaking him. It was a heart-stopping moment: was this the early Safety Car that had been predicted? A green flag replaced the yellow as Bortoleto reversed his Sauber to keep going. Those who were ready to pit immediately stood down. The barrier needed to be inspected though, so a Virtual Safety Car was instigated. Tsunoda, Gasly, Bearman and Bortoleto pitted with the Haas experiencing problems.
The race went on for a further eight laps, until Gasly went into the back of his old chum Tsunoda and lost a front wheel. Piastri slowed as there were waved yellow flags for the debris on the track but Verstappen right behind him did not. Gasly had no brakes and could not stop; he couldn't park the car at the side and he couldn't stop when he got into the pit lane either. Eventually he stopped but pretty much in the Williams garage, the pit lane was closed. However, Gasly could have gone down an escape road much earlier but chose to keep going and nearly took off his team mate as he careered across the corner.
Hulkenberg was the first driver to take a proper stop. This triggered others. Hadjar had been running well and pitted from fifth, exiting ahead of his team mate in eighth, a good result for the Racing Bulls. Norris pitted on lap 20 of 78 and came out in fourth behind LeClerc, Piastri and Verstappen. Bearman and Hadjar did a quick change of tyres so that they had their stops all done. Piastri's stop was very slow but would not be able to jump LeClerc. Despite putting in the fastest lap of the race, he didn't.
It seemed everything had calmed down. The front runners were complaining that the marshals were not waving blue flags to tell the backmarkers to let them through. It felt like there should have been ten laps to go but, remarkably, there were forty laps to go and Alonso's engine gave out with a puff of smoke from sixth position. He would have scored some good points. The Aston Martin was parked neatly off the track by the ever-professional Spaniard.
With two thirds of the race gone, neither Mercedes had taken any of their mandatory pit stops. Russell got more and more frustrated behind Albon, who was deliberately holding up the pack for his team mate Sainz. Following closely, he cut the corner and refused to give the place back. The team asked him to again and he told them that he would take the five second penalty rather than concede. The stewards didn't like that and gave him a drive through penalty instead, which meant he would have to go slowly through the pit lane rather than take the pit straight on track as normal. This was very costly.
Then we waited for drivers to make their stops. Verstappen made his final one on the last lap, giving Norris the lead back. His finished there with LeClerc and Piastri behind him. Also in the points positions were Verstappen, Hamilton, Hadjar, Ocon (an excellent finish for the Haas), Lawson, Albon and Sainz. The Racing Bulls and Williams' did well to get some points and will keep their battle going.
There was general agreement that the two stop rule did not work. There's little time to party before heading to Barcelona. Piastri was still leading the championship and there's still plenty of time in his career to win at Monte Carlo.
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