Round in circles: a race that even its drivers find boring

The Monaco Grand Prix appeals to high-rollers but on a track where overtaking is impossible the entertainment factor is zero, finds Kieran Jackson who turns to solutions

- Kieran Jackson

At Monaco 2024, after Charles Leclerc’s emotional first victory at his home race, another Formula One first. Never in the sport’s 74-year history had the top 10 from the start finished the race in the same order but, after a first-lap red flag meant all of the cars could change tyres and did not need to pit again, the order from qualifying took the chequered flag 24 hours later. What’s more, an overtake did not even look close to materialising.

Lewis Hamilton at least tried something different. A free pit stop on lap 52, saving his medium tyres from further graining and attempting an undercut on Max Verstappen ahead, but Red Bull simply responded with a pit stop of their own a lap later to thwart the Mercedes driver. The other eight drivers kept position comfortably. Not out of choice, but out of sheer reality.

It’s nothing new: without a driver mistake or strategy mishap, you cannot overtake at Monaco. There is one DRS zone and it is one of the smallest straights on the calendar. The slow-speed twists and turns of the famous principality is, more so now than ever, unsuited to the large, stiff nature of modern-day F1 cars.