The Mexican Sergio Pérez (Red Bull) won the Monaco Grand Prix this Sunday at 6 p.m., the seventh event of the 2022 season of the Formula 1 World Championship, after a rather chaotic race marked by rain and the big outing of german road Mick Schumacher (Haas).
Sergio Pérez, third on the starting grid, took advantage of the good strategy put in place by the Red Bull team while Scuderia Ferrari had a more complicated afternoon due to poor choices.
In pole position, the Monegasque Charles Leclerc had to settle for fourth place in his home Grand Prix – which he finished for the first time! -, while his Spanish teammate Carlos Sainz finished second.
The leader of the World Championship, the Dutchman Max Verstappen (Red Bull), climbed on the third step of the podium and therefore did the right thing in view of the fight for the title, which seemed quite compromised at the end of the qualifying session on Saturday…
Max Verstappen, 125 points, now has nine ahead of Charles Leclerc (116), author of five pole positions in the space of seven Grands Prix this season. Sergio Pérez is back in the wake of the leading duo with 110 units.
The start of this Monaco Grand Prix had been given more than an hour late, behind the safety car, due to the rain which had fallen on the circuit shortly before the scheduled start time (3 p.m.) .
After two formation laps behind the safety car around 3:15 p.m., the red flag had been raised, and the cars had returned to the pit lane, the rain increasing in intensity.
Charles Leclerc, who switched from “wet” to intermediate tires two laps later than Sergio Pérez, lost the Grand Prix lead after the two tire changes that occurred in the space of a few laps: to switch from “rain” to intermediates, then intermediates to hard, the track drying up quickly.
Blocked behind his teammate Carlos Sainz in the pit lane, Charles Leclerc lost time… and his calm: the Monegasque fell from first to fourth place, just behind his rival Max Verstappen.
While the drivers were balancing in conditions that were still very tricky, Mick Schumacher lost control of his Haas. After crashing into the safety rail on the right of the track, Mick Schumacher went to embed his car in the Tecpro blocks located on the other side. The impact was so violent that the German driver’s single-seater literally split in two.
Mick Schumacher, unscathed, quickly got out of his single-seater. He was able to reach the pit lane on foot before going to be inspected by the circuit doctors.
After a new interruption of the race – about twenty minutes this time – the debates were able to resume until 6 p.m. (three hours after the theoretical start)… and the Grand Prix did not go to its end. (64 rather than the planned 77 rpm).