Mark Webber was untouchable around the principality of Monaco as he aced around the street track and picked up his and Red Bull’s second victory on the trot. It was a perfect race from Webber, as he led from pole-to-finish and took home maximum points. Teammate Sebastian Vettel finished 2nd, making it the second Red Bull 1-2 of the season. Renault’s Robert Kubica finished 3rd, after he was jumped at the start by Vettel. The race finished under the Safety Car, which was brought out as a result of an accident between Lotus’ Jarno Trulli and HRT’s Karun Chandhok.
Ferrari’s Felipe Massa finished 4th followed by McLaren’s Lewis Hamilton in 5th. Fernando Alonso – who started from the pit-lane after sitting out qualifying – drove a solid race and would have finished 6th but on the last lap, just as the Safety Car pulled in, Michael Schumacher passed him into taking the place. Alonso eventually was classified 7th, ahead of Nico Rosberg in 8th places with the two Force Indias of Adrian Sutil and Vitantonio Liuzzi taking home the last of the points in 9th and 10th respectively.
Update: Michael Schumacher’s overtaking move over Fernando Alonso was deemed illegal and he was penalised by adding 20 seconds to his race time, which drops him to 12th and moves up Alonso to 6th place. Rosberg, Sutil and Liuzzi move up a place with Sebastian Buemi moving upto 10th place to take the last point.
It was a right dramatic start for the Monaco Grand Prix as Williams’ rookie Nico Hulkenberg crashed in the tunnel on the very first lap, bringing out the Safety Car. This, after Webber made a clear start and Vettel got the jump on Kubica. Championship leader Jenson Button had a woeful start as his Mercedes Engine gave way on the second lap and he had to retire. At the restart, Webber maintained his lead as at the back of the grid Alonso made his way up the grid after a quick pit stop to get onto the hard tyres. Almost all the teams ran one-stop strategies as they switched onto the second type of tyre compound and nursed them through the race.
) The Ferraris of Felipe Massa and Fernando Alonso were the early pace-setters and were briefly P1 for a while before the Red Bulls of Mark Webber & Sebastian Vettel quickly established them at the top of the timesheets. But Fernando Alonso had the last say as he ended Q1 on P1, with Adrian Sutil of Force India a very credible P3. The ones to face the axe at the end of the first qualifying session included the Toro Rosso of Jaime Algersuari, the two Virgin cars of Timo Glock & Lucas di Grassi, the two Lotuses of Heikki Kovalainen & Jarno Trulli and the two Hispanias of Bruno Senna & Karun Chandhok.
