[Renjith_Mani]

Once again F1 is becoming a dull affair with Mercedes drivers almost becoming the obvious winners. I was so glad when Vettel became beatable and the competition was once again for all the top spots. It is becoming even worse now. Unless something go horribly wrong for the Mercedes duo, one of them is going to finish first and the other second.

Do anyone thing its good for the sport?

[ecenandu]

Originally Posted by Renjith_Mani

Once again F1 is becoming a dull affair with Mercedes drivers almost becoming the obvious winners. I was so glad when Vettel became beatable and the competition was once again for all the top spots. It is becoming even worse now. Unless something go horribly wrong for the Mercedes duo, one of them is going to finish first and the other second.

Do anyone thing its good for the sport?

Tell me one thing, when was the last time we had multiple guys going for the championship? Vettel's first championship in 2010 was down to the wire and also in 2012.

F1 always has been like this, don't you think so?

[jfxavier]

Originally Posted by ecenandu

Tell me one thing, when was the last time we had multiple guys going for the championship? Vettel's first championship in 2010 was down to the wire and also in 2012.

F1 always has been like this, don't you think so?

F1 has had various teams having dominant runs lasting few years after every rule change.
If you go back before the Redbull years, you can find the years dominated by Renault, Ferrari, Williams, McLaren and a few others who are not in the sport presently.
The people behind the F1 cars are all incredibly talented & competitive and hence sometimes it becomes difficult to negate the advantage of a team once they have had a head start. But sooner or later that gap is narrowed down so that an incredibly talented driver can attempt to overcome the performance deficit. Many of the greatest drives from the great drivers have come in situations like that.

[D33-PAC]

the cars were squirming around the track way too much, more so than the cars of 2012 when the levels of downforce were like glue.

i suspect the mid field could create some drama tomorrow. Especially if the slightly accident prone Perez feels ambitious.

[deetjohn]

That was an almighty lap from Lewis after complaining about tyre pressures all through Saturday.

Rosberg looked good in Q1 and Q2. But he locked up his front right on two consecutive laps at Sainte Devote to throw it away.

Ferrari struggled with low temperature, else could have split the Mercedes after mistakes by Rosberg. RBR looks good. If the temperature is high enough and can release the car onto an empty piece of track, then maybe Ferrari can undercut at least one of the Mercedes. Let's see what happens.

[zenren]

Originally Posted by deetjohn

That was an almighty lap from Lewis after complaining about tyre pressures all through Saturday.

Rosberg looked good in Q1 and Q2. But he locked up his front right on two consecutive laps at Sainte Devote to throw it away.

Ferrari struggled with low temperature, else could have split the Mercedes after mistakes by Rosberg. RBR looks good. If the temperature is high enough and can release the car onto an empty piece of track, then maybe Ferrari can undercut at least one of the Mercedes. Let's see what happens.

There is every chance that the top 3 would pull away from the rest really quick. RBRs are unlikely to be able to keep up with the top 3 and it could be interesting. In case a safety car causes cars to pit, the second Mercedes is going to be highly vulnerable and might lose the position to Vettel easily if they are running close. Vettel would also be trying to ensure he is having the Mercedes in his sight to ensure he can make use of that opportunity.

Kimi is likely try the outside of Ricciardo to jump the Red Bulls. It remains to be seen if it would work or not. Again, he picked up a puncture in 2013 and 2014. It remains to be seen if he'll make it 3 in a row!

[Renjith_Mani]

Originally Posted by jfxavier

F1 has had various teams having dominant runs lasting few years after every rule change.
If you go back before the Redbull years, you can find the years dominated by Renault, Ferrari, Williams, McLaren and a few others who are not in the sport presently.
The people behind the F1 cars are all incredibly talented & competitive and hence sometimes it becomes difficult to negate the advantage of a team once they have had a head start. But sooner or later that gap is narrowed down so that an incredibly talented driver can attempt to overcome the performance deficit. Many of the greatest drives from the great drivers have come in situations like that.

True that in some years it went to the last race to have a champion. But during all those Vettel years he was heavy favourite to win all races. The plug failure of Bahrain race, loose wheel nut in Australia, Webber's collision with him in some other race etc made lost him several points in the early part of the race. Except the puncture he got on driving out of track behind Massa, everything else was unfortunate loss of points. That took the championship to last date.

2012 was rather a different story. The fuel pump drama was so harsh on vettel, further the competition rules was changed to address Vettel's dominance. I think that was the time when 50 points were awarded for the last race winner. That rule change itself suggest that in the current era, due to dominance of one or two drivers, if the last race points are kept same the competition might well be over before the begining of the race.


As I type this, there is a Hamilton-Rosberg-Vettel finish on cards

[deetjohn]

Man! That crash has turned the race on its head.

Lewis is now 3rd with a much faster car (read very fresh tyres) behind Nico and Vettel.

Edit:
Crazy! Don't know why Mercedes waited that long to bring in Lewis. The team just lost Lewis P1 and Nico is one lucky bloke.

[D33-PAC]

What the hell happened ? When I dozed off Lewis was leading. When I woke up Toto Wolff was saying they screwed up the race for Lewis and he came in 3rd ?

Recap please !? Someone!

[tharian]

That was crazy. Why did they pit Lewis? I haven't seen Lewis this cheesed off. Monaco being a race which every top driver wants to win and Rosberg does a hat trick after Lewis leads 90% of the race.

[gpa]

What a race! Lewis is gutted and its clearly visible on his face on the podium. A clear error of judgement by the team as put by Niki Lauda and Toto Wolf. Great to see Vettel pick up P2.

[ashwin.terminat]

Originally Posted by D33-PAC

What the hell happened ? When I dozed off Lewis was leading. When I woke up Toto Wolff was saying they screwed up the race for Lewis and he came in 3rd ?

Recap please !? Someone!

Verstappen and Grosjean were involved in an accident that brought out the safety car.

The safety car picked up the race leader at the time, Lewis Hamilton and later, Lewis pitted.

When he came out, the safety car was still on, but Rosberg had already gotten the jump on him and he was just a meter or so behind Vettel and eventually, Lewis had to give up 2nd place as well.

With just 7 odd laps to go, Lewis pushed Vettel as Vettel's soft compound tyre had cooled down during the safety car stint. But was unable to get through. Then towards the end of the race, he had Ricciardo on his tail and he had to ensure he kept the podium position, so switched from attack to defence mode. Ricciardo was allowed to pass Kvyat a few laps ago under team orders and when he didn't make any more places through the last lap, the RBR team asked him to hand the place back to Kvyat. So Ricciardo waited until Kvyat crossed the line and then crossed it himself.

So as it stood,
1) Rosberg
2) Vettel
3) Hamilton
4) Kvyat
5) Ricciardo

That said, the Star Sports broadcast was horrible. They stopped the broadcast exactly when the interviews were about to begin.

I caught the interviews on starsports.com

Nico accepted that Lewis too deserved to win the race. He said it is difficult for drivers n the track to gauge why Lewis was brought in, as it could involve a plethora of reasons. Overall, he didn't seem very guilty about picking up the victory and shouldn't feel so as well, neither him or Lewis had anything to do with the pit stop.

Vettel was content. He said 2nd place was like a bonus that he didn't expect. The Safety Car stint cooled down his Soft tyres and we wasn't sure if he could hold off Lewis, who was on a fresh set of super softs. But 2-3 laps after the Safety Car was called in, it was game on again once the tyres were reasonably heated up.

Lewis, was visibly and obviously understandably dejected. He took forever to park his car and ended shunting into the 3rd place placard. Martin Brundle apologized to Lewis on behalf of all the viewers, Lewis just nodded. But yet, he didn't bash his team or downplay Nico's victory or Vettel's 2nd place. Credited the team by saying that they have worked very hard all year and they win and lose together. When asked why he was pitted, he said that the team will sit down and find out ways to improve. When asked what is going through his mind now that he has lost the Monaco GP, he replied with:
"Come back to win the next one."


Toto Wolff and Niki Lauda both openly acknowledged it was a grave error to bring in Lewis given the circumstances he was in. And Toto even apologised to Lewis. Here's them accepting their mistake on Facebook as well. Toto Wolff mentioned that they didn't not see the gap Lewis had the way it was and there was some utter confusion when Lewis complained about dropping grip levels, leading them to call him in.

[slicvic]

Wonder how the guy who miscalculated Hamilton's pit call is going to face Hamilton. It's Monaco, feather in the cap for everyone and he just blew it!!!

On the other hand Nico, gets it on a platter. Third Monaco victory in a row, fourth driver to do so.

[asr245]

Well, that was boring, till they pitted Lewis for the 2nd time. He's going to be one gloomy baby tonight. And he wouldn't be wrong either. This was totally his win. Toto said something about him complaining about grip levels. That caused confusion in the garage & they thought they could pit him & get him out before Rosberg. Maybe he should complain less.

Yes, I am no Lewis fan though he totally should have won today.

[zenren]

That was absolute blunder from Mercedes pit wall! They really screwed up trying to squeeze in a pit stop for Lewis when he could have easily carried on with the existing set. The commentary comparing Rosberg's 3rd consecutive win elevating him to the likes of Senna was really disappointing.

Stewards were a little too lenient on Ricciardo nudging Raikkonen and getting past. I doubt if Ricciardo would have got past without such a move.

Overall, a very boring race that ended in the most undeserving manner.

Among this whole fiasco, McLaren finally bagged their first points.