MONACO — Formula 1’s two-stop experiment at the Monaco Grand Prix underlined what the sport already knew about its most famous race: the confines of the 94-year-old circuit are too tight to allow genuine racing.
Adding a compulsory second pit stop was never going to change that fact, but it did have the potential to distract from it. Arguably it succeeded in that task by providing a more dynamic race than the previous year, but with just one legal overtake in 78 laps, the fundamental issue with Monaco as an F1 venue was clear to see.
“You can’t race here,” reigning champion Max Verstappen said after finishing fourth. “It doesn’t matter what you do; one stop, ten stops.
“Even at the end, I was in the lead, my tires were completely gone and you still can’t pass. Nowadays with an F1 car, you can [only] pass an F2 car around here. I get [the mandatory two-stop strategy] but I don’t think it’s worked.
“We were almost doing Mario Kart. We have to install bits on the car and maybe you can throw bananas around! Slippery surface!”
Whether the two-stop rule was a worthwhile experiment was up for debate on Sunday evening. George Russell, who spent a large part of the race staring at the rear of the two Williams cars ahead of him, was adamant it had added nothing.
“We definitely need to have a real think about what the solution is here in Monaco,” Russell said. “I appreciate trying something this year for two stops, but clearly it did not work at all.”
There was an element of jeopardy in the final stages, as Verstappen, who had only made one of his two stops up until lap 77 of 78, clung on to the lead in the hope a late accident would allow him to make his second tire change under a red flag, retain the lead and sneak out a victory. Arguably, that made the last 20 laps compulsory viewing, even if the sting in the tail never materialized.
“I would say it was an improvement, it was strategically more interesting, there was more jeopardy to it,” Red Bull team principal Christian Horner said. “Certainly better than last year where there was just a procession, but the fundamental problem is you cannot overtake here and you can drive around three or four seconds off the pace.”
From Lando Norris‘s perspective in the race-winning McLaren, it was a nerve-wracking experience as he kept to a relatively conventional strategy by making his pit stops on laps 19 and 50. He had the fastest car, barely made an error all race, but still ran the risk of having his first win on the streets of Monaco snatched away by an unfortunately timed red flag.
“It made it a lot more scary for me,” he said after Verstappen’s late strategy also backed him into the Ferrari of Charles Leclerc behind. “I wish it was a one-stop, it would have been a lot more chilled. It’s not for me! But the rules are not made for me, they’re not made for us to enjoy it more or whatever. They’re made for the fans, they’re made to provide more entertainment for the viewers. I don’t know if that was the case.”
The lack of overtaking created different issues in the midfield as teams quickly identified the possibility of using their two drivers to work together. The second driver would be asked by the pit wall to back up the pack, thereby creating a gap for the sister car ahead to complete their pit stops and not lose position.
The trend of driving deliberately slow was started by Liam Lawson while running in ninth place, three places behind his Racing Bulls teammate Isack Hadjar. By lapping consistently two to four seconds off his teammate, Lawson held up the faster Williams and Mercedes cars behind, which allowed Hadjar to complete his full quota of pit stops on lap 14 and lap 19, and still emerge ahead of Lawson and the chasing pack.
Hadjar lost a place to Lewis Hamilton in the process, but the superior pace of the Ferrari over the Racing Bull meant there was always a risk the seven-time world champion would maneuver himself ahead by undercutting or overcutting in the pit stops.
Williams, which failed to unleash the superior performance of its cars to move ahead of the Racing Bulls, then felt obliged to employ similar tactics to keep the two Mercedes drivers of Russell and Kimi Antonelli at bay.
From lap 25 to lap 40, Carlos Sainz drove multiple seconds off the pace of his teammate Alex Albon ahead, which created a gap for Albon to make his two pit stops in on laps 32 and 40. Once Albon had completed his mandatory stops, he let Sainz through on lap 43 and then repaid the favor by holding up the Mercedes drivers so that Sainz could make his stops on laps 48 and 53.
Russell became fed up with the tactics on lap 50 and cut the Nouvelle Chicane to pass Albon, knowing full well he would get a penalty in the process. The stewards took a dim view of Russell’s tactics and slapped him with a drive-through — a significantly harsher penalty than a driver would normally expect to receive for going off track and gaining an advantage — but Russell still benefited from the illegal overtake and finished 11th.
“I didn’t really care [about the penalty] because I was out of the points,” Russell said. “I didn’t get the chance yesterday to enjoy Monaco [after an electrical issue put an end to his qualifying], and I just said, ‘Screw it, I want to enjoy Monaco.’
“I want to enjoy driving this track full gas. It’s one of the best circuits in the world. And that’s what I did. The last 25 laps was the most fun I’ve had all weekend. Pretty exhilarating. I was really pushing my limits, testing myself. And as I said, ironically, if I didn’t do this, I would have finished maybe 15th or 16th.”
At the checkered flag, Williams team principal James Vowels and his former boss at Mercedes, Toto Wolff, exchanged the following text messages.
Vowles: “I’m sorry. We had no choice given what happened ahead.”
Wolff: “We know.”
Although this year’s two-stop regulation made the tactic of slowing to help a teammate more obvious, and in some cases more extreme, it is nothing new around the streets of Monaco.
“In the past, in 2019, Lando did it for me, and I finished P6, with McLaren,” Sainz said. “So, this has been going on for years now, around Monaco, and it’s allowed.
McLaren’s Lando Norris and Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc react to their P1 and P2 finishes at the Monaco Grand Prix.
“Today, I suffered it [behind Lawson], then I benefited from it [ahead of the Mercedes]. I ultimately just don’t want the sport to allow you to be able to do this, or to find a solution to how Monaco [can prevent] this.”
Sainz was driving so slowly at times during Sunday’s race that he even had the mental capacity to think about how F1 should solve the issue.
“I had time in the car to think about it, because I was driving so slow, behind and in front of people, that I was like, ‘What could we do for this not to be allowed?'” Sainz added. “Ultimately, you’re driving two or three seconds off the pace that the car can do. You are ultimately manipulating the race, and manipulating the outcome a bit.
“So, we should find a way that this cannot be done in the future, because I have the feeling that every year, people are going to do it more and more, and it’s becoming more of a trend the last few years. In that sense, the two stops, if anything, helped to maybe spice up around the pit windows, to have two pit stops, but it made us have to do the slow driving twice, which is not a very good thing for the sport.”
Wolff believes one solution could be to set a minimum lap time that the drivers have to stick to. A similar rule is currently applied in qualifying to stop cars creating dangerous situations during in-laps and out-laps, but it would come with more complications in a race.
“I think what we can look at is to create some more specific regulations so that there’s only a maximum of backoff [in pace] that you can have,” Wolff said. “You can’t hold up a train, overtaking here is difficult, but what if you can’t go slower than X seconds from the leaders? That would probably create a little bit more of a closer field. Does it improve the overtaking? I don’t think that’s feasible.”
Which brings F1 back to the fundamental issue with Monaco: a lack of overtaking opportunities and a layout that the current cars can’t race on. It’s nothing new, but Horner believes its time to address it head on.
“I think the only way to really encouraging any form of overtaking is trying to create a bit more braking area, either on the exit of the tunnel or turn one if there was any way of creating a longer braking zone somewhere, we should really investigate it,” the Red Bull team principal said. “The cars are so big now that you just don’t have a chance to get alongside.
“I think everything has to move with the times ultimately, it’s an iconic and historic circuit but if you look at how Monaco has changed, how much land they’ve reclaimed into the sea into the 72 appearances here, I don’t think you’d need to do too much. There just needs to be one area where you can have an overtake, and everybody knows that coming here.
“The race was pretty much done [in qualifying], and we’ve introduced another dynamic with the pit stop, which ultimately for the top 10 other than the retirement nobody really changed position.”
Russell, perhaps still reeling from the frustration of the race, offered up one other possibility. It’s an option F1 would likely never adopt and an option purists would likely refuse to accept — double down on the one day at Monaco that can never be missed: qualifying.
“Do we accept that there should be no race? And it’s a qualifying race,” Russell asked. “You do one [qualifying session] on Saturday, one on Sunday. And the guy who qualifies pole gets some points. He gets a little trophy, and the one on Sunday gets some more points.
“Because that’s what we love most. I think that’s what you guys enjoy watching the most. And 99% of the other people in Monaco are here sipping Champagne on the yacht, so they don’t really care.”
Source: espn.com