Kimi Antonelli continued to shine as he claimed his fifth consecutive victory with a spectacular win in the Monaco Grand Prix. But who else made their mark on our Power Rankings judges at the historic circuit? Check out the latest scores and overall leaderboard below…
Antonelli was the perfect example of how to slowly grow your confidence around the twisty Monte Carlo circuit – he couldn’t quite match the pace of Ferrari during Friday’s running, but things clicked into place and he delivered a sublime lap in the final moments of Qualifying to snatch pole position. From there, the Italian was unstoppable as he maintained the lead of the Grand Prix and stayed calm amid the drama unfolding around him to take a magnificent victory in the Principality. Our judges duly awarded him a perfect 10 for his breathtaking performance.
Lewis Hamilton continues to go from strength to strength in his second campaign with the Scuderia, following up his P2 finish in Canada with another second place in Monaco. He and Charles Leclerc hit the ground running from the outset, but it was the Briton who led the team in Qualifying and took advantage of Max Verstappen’s early retirement to gain a position. A penalty for speeding in the pit lane didn’t affect his final result, allowing him to leapfrog George Russell in the overall standings.
It may not have ended with the Monaco podium of his dreams, but Pierre Gasly nevertheless enjoyed a strong weekend that saw him reclaim the role of the lead Alpine driver. After squeezing into Q3, he executed a brilliant start to pass McLaren’s Lando Norris on the opening lap and gradually climbed up the order. When he crossed the line in third place, he thought he had fulfilled a long-awaited return to the top three, but was brought crashing back to earth as he was informed of a cumulative 10-second time penalty that demoted him to P7.
Liam Lawson had somewhat of a shaky weekend as Racing Bulls rushed to fix a number of issues with his car, including one that jeopardised his hard-fought P10 grid slot. The New Zealander thankfully did manage to make lights out and, like Gasly, patiently gained positions as a number of drivers ahead retired from the race. By staying out of trouble, he went on to take P5 – the equal highest Grand Prix result of his career so far.
Bouncing back from a DNS in Canada, Arvid Lindblad joined Lawson in producing a double points finish for Racing Bulls – something he may not have predicted after struggling to even turn around the hairpin in FP1. His first Qualifying session in an F1 car at Monaco was always going to be a challenge, and he settled for P15 before capitalising on the two restarts to improve to P6, similarly claiming his best finish of the season.
Verstappen looked significantly off the pace throughout practice, but managed to post a blistering lap in the final part of Qualifying that left him just four hundredths of a second adrift of Antonelli’s pole lap, marking a fantastic turnaround for the Red Bull driver. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to show what he could achieve on Sunday as he failed to get off the line and tumbled to last place, with the issue forcing him to return to the pits and retire from the race.
Red Bull’s weekend was overwhelmed by car issues, with Isack Hadjar panicking that something was “going to explode” during the race whilst he fought to keep Mercedes’ Russell behind. Further problems with power and tyre degradation ensured that he couldn’t afford to lose his focus for even a second, but he held on and was cleared of a red flag infringement, confirming his first podium with the Milton Keynes outfit.
Although Cadillac have prioritised celebrating the small wins this season, it briefly looked like they had ticked off the more major achievement of their first points thanks to Sergio Perez. The Mexican driver recovered from a brake fire in FP2 to qualify P18, which quickly turned into P16 when he mistakenly pulled into Gabriel Bortoleto’s vacant grid spot. He carried out a drive-through penalty for the error but was later punished again for being out of position at the restart, demoting him from P10 to P15 as 10s was added onto his time.
Esteban Ocon secured his best finish of the season as he crossed the line in P9 at the Monaco Grand Prix, gaining an impressive eight positions after tangling with his team mate Ollie Bearman on the opening lap. He benefitted from the late contact between Carlos Sainz and Nico Hulkenberg to move even further up the order, becoming the sole finisher for Haas.
It was an interesting weekend for Alex Albon, who narrowly missed out on a spot in Q3 and lined up P11 for the 78-lap race. Points were within reach, but he dropped out of the top 10 after obeying team orders to allow Sainz through to complete an alternative strategy. Williams swapped the duo back later in the race, meaning that Albon was able to add a crucial four points to his tally.
Missing out
Just missing out on a spot in the top 10 is Ferrari’s Leclerc – he started his home race from fourth on the grid before the problems with his brakes became too significant to manage, and he crashed into the wall at the final corner.
