What to expect from Monaco 2018?

This weekend the 76th Monaco Grand Prix and the 65th Formula 1 Grand Prix will be driven in the streets of Monaco.

The race in the luxurious but very small state on the Mediterranean sea is for a lot of drivers the most prestige to win and their "home" grand prix race.

About 8 out of the 20 drivers that take part in current 2018 F1 season live in Monaco the most of their free time. As far as we know the following drivers live in Monaco or have their residence in the tax free heaven: Lewis Hamilton, Sergio Pérez, Daniel Ricciardo, Nico Hulkenberg, Valtteri Bottas, Charles Leclerc (also born in Monaco), Brandon Hartley and Max Verstappen.

2018 Monaco Facts & Figures

The Monaco street circuit of today is 3.337 km long and the shortest circuit on the 2018 F1 calendar. The track runs clockwise and has 19 turns, 11 left-handers and 8 right-handers. The slowest is turn 6 with 65 km/h and the fastest corner is turn 9 in the tunnel with a speed around 260 km/h.

Kimi Raikkonen broke the qualifying record lap time last year in the Ferrari SF70H and set it to 1:12.178. The lap record is set by Sergio Pérez in the Force India during last years race to 1:14:820.

The most races in Monaco are still won by Ayrton Senna. He won 6 times with 5 consecutive wins. Even Michael Schumacher didn't uncrown the Brazilian Legend. The 7 times WC won 5 times in Monaco, just like Graham Hill did.

Today's 2018 F1 drivers are not near these figures. Even Lewis Hamilton who won 64 races, only won twice on this unforgiving circuit. Sebastian Vettel and Fernando Alonso also won 2 times in Monte Carlo. Hamilton could have won 3 races. Back in 2007 in his first race at Monaco he was kept behind Fernando Alonso, but was much quciker then his team mate at McLaren. This Sunday these 3 drivers can take the lead of the current drivers.

The most remarkable race is still the 1996 edition where only 3 drivers finished the wet race and French driver Olivier Panis won his one and only F1 grand prix and the last for his team Ligier. Hopefully it will rain on Sunday.

It always was hard to overtake someone in Monaco in the past, but because of last years wider cars it's become even harder to pass on the tight and twisty street circuit.

This 2018 race will be the first time we will see pink Hyper soft Pirelli tyres on the track. The tyres have the most grip of all types. Because of this new tyre we will definitely see a new lap record during qualifying and during the race.

Last years 2017 Monaco GP

2017 Monaco podium: 1. Vettel, 2. Raikkonen, 3. Ricciardo

Last year we saw both Ferrari's on front row on the grid with Raikkonen starting from pole. He drove in the lead in front of his teammate Sebastian Vettel until he pitted in lap 34. He then lost the lead to Vettel, who was able to do 5 more laps and pitted in lap 39. Vettel pitted for fresh tyres and kept the lead to Raikkonen and won the race.

Not much happened during the race. Daniel Ricciardo also did the same undercut as Vettel did to his teammate Max Verstappen at Red Bull.

In lap 60 Jenson Button in the McLaren flipped the Sauber of Pascal Wehrlein on his side in turn 8. Button was driving in the car of Fernando Alonso as the Spanish driver was racing the Indianapolis 500 for the first time in his career.

Ferrari didn't win in Monaco since 2001. So it was a welcome 1-2 victory for the famous Italian team.

2018 Monaco Weather Forecast

The weather forecast tells us that the whole weekend will be dry and partly sunny. 1st and 2nd practice will be driven on Thursday during the Monaco GP when it's 18ºC and quite humid at 77%.

On Saturday and Sunday the weather will be almost the same with temperatures around 22ºC with moderate wind (13 km/h) and still a quite high humidity of 71%.

Who will be on the 2018 Monaco podium?

1. Daniel Ricciardo?

Because there are no long straights in Monaco top speeds are not important, but cornering speed is. To go fast around corners you need downforce. Therefor cars with a lot of downforce have an advantage in Monaco.

The car with the most downforce this season is clearly the Red Bull RB14. The updates that Red Bull used in Barcelona worked out very well on the last slow sector on Catalunya circuit. This is very good news for the Milton Keynes based team.

2. Max Verstappen?

Max Verstappen didn't score a podium yet in Monaco and only finished once in three earlier race. His best finish was 5th last 2017 season. We don't know if this is motivating for Verstappen to perform well this season. His first 2018 podium in Barcelona will certainly give him confidence.

History shows that 28 (44%) of the drivers that started from pole won the Monaco Grand Prix. 23% from P2, 17% from P3 and only 5% from P4. To choose the favourite for pole in Monaco we have to look at the track records of both Red Bull drivers. We only saw 3 overtakes last year.

3. Sebastian Vettel?

Verstappen didn't score a pole position in his F1 career yet, while Daniel Ricciardo scored 1 and that one was in Monaco (2016). Ricciardo also scored 2 podiums in Monaco while 20 years old Verstappen only finished once as 5th (2017). Statistically Ricciardo gets the benefit and should picked as favourite for the pole and the win.

Second place should be taken by Verstappen, but you never know what happens. With a safety car probability of 52% anything can happen and we know how good Verstappen can look after his tyres.

Because the tyre construction for Monaco is the version before the Spanish Grand Prix that suited the Ferrari SF71H far better, they should take P3 with Sebastian Vettel.

If Lewis Hamilton can finish in the points he extends the longest consecutive points finishes to 31 races.

Below you can see the tyre chooses of each driver for this weekend.

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