Rate the Race and Driver of the weekend – Race 6, Monaco 2017

Mean Reader Score: 4.16

Well, as you can see from the score this race was rated lowest of the season so far, with a miserly 4.16 mean reader score. Hardly surprising really as this was

1. The second race of this season without any ‘real’ overtaking and
2. Monaco.

Unlike last year (which scored a much more respectable 7.31) when we had a miserable  Ricciardo taking second place on the podium; this year he was delighted  with third place. Last year Red Bull’s monumental error cost him the win from pole when he was brought into the pits to be met by a tyre-less team who then had to fall over themselves to get his tyres changed.  This year, however, Red Bull’s strategy worked in his favour and he moved up from P5 on the starting grid to P3 at the chequered flag.

There was no drama at the star of the race, as it was pretty clean, with most cars settling into a precession in grid order: Raikkonen on pole followed by Vettel, Bottas, Verstappan, Ricciardo, Sainz, Perez, Grosjean, Magnussen (who moved up from 11th) and Hulkenberg. What? No Hamilton in the top 10? Nope, he had an abysmal qualifying session and didn’t make it out of Q2, only moving up to P13 due to Vandoorne’s penalty.

Jenson Button had an ongoing feud with Wehrlein which started in the pit lane and ended on Lap 60 at Portier, with a rather unpleasant collision which left Jenson with a broken front left wheel and Pascal trapped in his upended car, pinned to the wall. Thankfully both drivers were ok.

Overcut was the successful strategy move of the day, with it being applied successfully to Ricciardo’s race who moved up from P5 to P3 and to Vettel, who progressed from P2 to P1, eventually taking his third win of this season and increased his lead in the driver standings to 25 points over his nearest rival, Hamilton (who finished 7th.) Vettel won the F1 Driver of the Day, but not our Driver of the Weekend. That accolade was reserved for……

Driver of the Weekend: Kevin Magnussen: 71.90% of reader vote.

The Danes descended on the website in droves this weekend, sweeping Magnussen to a clear victory in this poll. Swings and roundabouts in qualifying, as he was held up by Hamilton’s slow out lap and caught out by the yellow flags from Vandoorne’s incident. Having qualified in P13, he moved up to P11 on the starting grid (Button and Vandoorne had penalties) moving quickly into P9 after lights out. He stayed on ultrasoft tyres until  lap 37 but unfortunately was back in the pit again five laps later, having picked up a puncture from a raised drain cover at St Devote. Perez collided with Kvyat and had to pit, all of which resulted in Kevin coming home in P10, picking up his second points of the season. The double Haas points finish brings his team level with Renault on 14 points in the constructor standings. Well done Kevin!!