He may not have been a very happy man when his teammate Kimi Raikkonen secured pole position for the Monaco Grand Prix, but Sebastian Vettel was one very happy Ferrari driver when at the end of 78 laps around the streets of Monte Carlo it was his car that took the chequered flag in first place, the first Ferrari victory in Monaco since Michael Schumacher back in 2001.

Teammate Kimi Raikkonen, who had been leading the way all the way up until his one and only pitstop, crossed the line in second place and the result has caused a stir in Formula One circles. While there were no official team orders in play, the team called Kimi in early, for no apparent reason, and left Sebastian out for a lot longer so as to perform the ‘overcut'.

During those laps, where Kimi had been released into traffic after his stop, Vettel was in clean air and managed to put in some very quick laps so that when he came out after his stop, he was in the lad on his way to twenty five very valuable world championship points.

Standing on the podium after the race, Kimi looked very dejected…

“I don't know. Obviously it didn't work out very well for me. Other than that… not much I can say about it. It's still second place, but it doesn't count a lot in my books at least. It doesn't feel awfully good  that is how it goes sometimes. One of those days we should have had a bit more. I was called in. That is about it. Obviously they had reasons for it, but it is not up to me to answer.”

Daniel Ricciardo, who was denied his due here last season, finished third ahead of the Mercedes of Valtteri Bottas. Ricciardo also used the same strategy as Vettel in order to jump his teammate, Max Verstappen, who eventually finished the race in fifth place. Carlos Sainz was sixth followed home by Lewis Hamilton, who also stayed out extra-long in order to jump a few places from his 13th place grid slot. Romain Grosjean, Felipe Massa and Kevin Magnussen rounded out the top ten with only 13 drivers finishing the race.

There was a very scary accident that saw the Sauber of Pascal Wehrlein up against the barriers side on before the entrance to the tunnel after a coming together with the McLaren of Jenson Button. Button was also forced to retire as a result of the incident with the other McLaren of Stoffel Vandoorne also crashing out when he was set for a points scoring finish after the Force India of Sergio Perez attempted an ill-fated overtaking move.

  1. Sebastian Vettel, Ferrari
    2. Kimi Raikkonen. Ferrari
    3. Daniel Ricciardo, Red Bull
    4. Valtteri Bottas, Mercedes
    5. Max Verstappen, Red Bull
    6. Carlos Sainz, Toro Rosso
    7. Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes
    8. Romain Grosjean, Haas
    9. Felipe Massa, Williams
    10. Kevin Magnussen, Haas
    11. Jolyon Palmer, Renault
    12. Esteban Ocon, Force India
    13. Sergio Perez, Force India