Ferrari may now have the fastest car to challenge Red Bull and McLaren regularly. Photo / Don Kennedy
Monaco-born Charles Leclerc dreamed of winning his home grand prix and finally, in his sixth start in the race, it is a dream fulfilled.
He did it in style, putting his Ferrari in pole position, leading all the way and joyfully crossing the finish line well ahead of the McLaren of Oscar Piastri and his Ferrari teammate, Carlos Sainz.
Five drives in the iconic event in his hometown had not brought Leclerc a podium finish, let alone victory. Last year, he also started in pole position but engine failure on the way to the grid eliminated any chance of success. Now he can put all that agony behind him and enjoy his sixth grand prix win overall, ending a 39-race winless streak going back to the 2022 Austrian GP.
Leclerc’s win was as popular as Lando Norris’ maiden victory in the Miami GP two races back, except that this one was a home victory, something every F1 driver wants to achieve. Leclerc was initially unable to explain how it felt to take the chequered flag in his home event.
“No words can explain that it’s such a difficult race, I think the fact that twice I’ve been starting on pole position and we couldn’t quite make it makes it even better in a way.
“It means a lot, obviously. It’s the race that made me dream of becoming a Formula One driver one day. It was a difficult race emotionally because already 15 laps to the end you’re just hoping that nothing happens, because the emotions were coming.”
Leclerc is one of those drivers who seems to wear his emotions on the sleeve of his racing overalls. He recalled the loss of his friend and fellow F1 driver Jules Bianchi, who died nine months after a crash in Japan in 2014, and the death of his father in 2017.
“Yes, I think it’s everything coming together, I thought about a lot of people today on the track, whether it’s Jules, my father, and that doesn’t happen normally in other races.
“In other races, my mental focus is all on the driving, but today I really struggled to actually extract that and, in the last 15 laps, it was just all of them in my head. Crossing the line, there was a lot of emotions because of that. I’m overall just so incredibly happy. However, tonight I’m going to party like an animal!”
Given overtaking is extremely difficult around the twists and turns of the Monaco street circuit, the foundation for Leclerc’s win undoubtedly came from taking pole position, whereas the pre-race favourite, world champion Max Verstappen, had – by his own high standards – a shocker, qualifying only sixth.
Last year Verstappen started from pole and won narrowly from the Aston Martin of Fernando Alonso. The latter continued his run of poor form by failing to get out of Q1, starting eventually from 14th on the grid after Nico Hulkenberg and Kevin Magnussen were demoted to the rear of the grid for technical breaches on their Haas cars. Back there with them was the other Red Bull of Sergio Perez, who had a terrible qualifying session by ending up 18th on the grid.
That would turn out to be double bad news for Perez, who is under pressure to retain his drive for next year.
Perez made a slow start and was quickly swamped by the two Haas drivers, with Hulkenberg passing him on the left and Magnussen attempting to do the same on the right. Three into two doesn’t go around the tight confines of the Monaco circuit. Magnussen hit Perez, sending his Red Bull catapulting into the unforgiving Armco barriers. Perez collected Hulkenberg too and all four wheels were torn off the Red Bull car, leaving an unhurt Perez sitting in the carbon fibre tub that once resembled a racing car.
Hulkenberg, who was an innocent victim of the crash, basically blamed both his teammate and Perez for what happened, even though the race stewards later decided there would be no penalties for any driver.
“I got taken out by an incident that I wasn’t actually involved in, but obviously it’s quite narrow here, going up to Turn 3. A big shame, things were getting too tight there. I think somewhat a racing incident, it looked maybe a bit optimistic from Kevin, but I don’t know, Checo [Perez] could have also maybe seen him and left room, so unfortunate obviously, the outcome.”
The race was immediately red-flagged as the clean-up began. More significantly it enabled all drivers to pit and swap the tyres they had started on and turn it into a one-stop strategy, which meant that, with overtaking so difficult, track position was everything.
Sainz had suffered a puncture on the first lap but, as nobody had completed a lap before the red flag was waved, he was able to resume his starting position of third and remain in that position to the finish. In fact, by the end of the race, the first 10 on the start grid finished in those positions.
We are used to seeing Verstappen overtake those ahead of him whenever he has started back in the field, but not this time. Coming into the race, he had been in pole position for eight consecutive races and could have set a new record, but it wasn’t to be. By finishing 6th, he has seen his championship lead over Leclerc shrink to 33 points.
Red Bull appear to be in some difficulty because, for three races, Verstappen has been complaining about the poor handling of a car that looked as if it could match last year’s record-breaking season when he won 19 races and Perez two to give the team 21 wins from 22 races.
Verstappen suggests the car’s weakness has been exposed, which is that it is vulnerable to bumps.
“It’s like I’m running without suspension,” he explained. “So, it’s just jumping around a lot, not absorbing any kerb strikes or bumps or camber changes. In the last corner, the amount of times that I just jumped almost into the wall, it’s pretty incredible.
“It’s also not something new, we’ve had this problem since 2022. For the last two years, I think we had a car advantage. So, then it gets masked a little bit because we gain in the corners where the curves and the bumps are not that much of a limitation. But with everyone catching up, naturally, when you’re not improving your weakest point, you get found out. That’s what happened this weekend.”
Piastri recorded his best grand prix result to date, with his teammate Norris 4th.
“Thanks to the whole team, it’s been a great weekend all round, and nice to finally put a result on the board,” he said. “I feel like I’ve been very strong for the last few weekends, but didn’t really have the result to show for it, so it’s nice to have a podium, and what better place?”
Norris was pleased with McLaren’s progress, noting: “We were ahead of Red Bull this weekend clearly but maybe a little bit behind Ferrari. But at the end of the day, Ferrari is doing a good job. We’re up there, we’re in with a chance in case something happens.”
Sainz has slipped behind Leclerc in both the points and on the track and is still not giving anything away about who he may drive for next year, given Lewis Hamilton has taken his drive for 2025.
“I haven’t made my mind up yet and don’t know where I’m going to be racing next year,” he said. “I also haven’t set any deadlines. But I can just tell you it’s such an important decision at this stage in my career that I want to have all the options on the table and take the right one and think about it carefully, because I’m about to turn 30 this year, and the next project is the project that I really want to make it work and see how it goes.”
Hamilton’s vacated drive at Mercedes must be an option, but the Sauber team has already signed Hulkenberg and will become Audi next year.
Hamilton, who finished 7th in Monaco, while teammate George Russell was 5th, must be privately chuffed to see Ferrari doing so well. When he left McLaren to join Mercedes in 2013, many people thought it was a mistake. But that move eventually brought him six world titles to go with the first one he got with McLaren in 2008.
Has Hamilton timed his move from Mercedes to Ferrari impeccably? With the Red Bull charge halted in Monaco, and Ferrari appearing to have the fastest car currently, Hamilton may be looking ahead to 2025 with growing confidence.
But Leclerc showed in his hometown that he is the equal of any of the drivers on the grid when he has a competitive car. He is unlikely to allow Hamilton to undermine his glowing status at Ferrari, as he sets his sights on not just more victories, but a first world championship that suddenly seems more feasible.