Max Verstappen waits until the last second to make his second mandatory pit stop in Monaco, but luck isn’t on his side – he then slams the new rule
No happy ending for Max Verstappen in Monaco: Although the Red Bull driver leads until the penultimate lap in the principality, he ultimately has to settle for fourth place – the reason being the new Formula 1 rule that stipulates two mandatory pit stops in Monte Carlo, the sometimes bizarre effects of which are immediately apparent in Verstappen’s race tactics:
The Red Bull driver therefore delayed his second stop until the last possible lap, taking the lead and hoping for a late red flag that could make him the big winner in the Monaco lottery: “I had nothing to lose,” Verstappen admitted later, referring to his tactics.
However, the Dutchman is still far from being a fan of the new format: Although he understands that the organizers want to do something about the lack of excitement on Monaco Sundays, “I don’t think it really made any difference,” Verstappen concluded rather harshly on Sky.
“Honestly, it was almost like Mario Kart. Then we just need to add some stuff to the car, maybe we can throw banana peels around too. I don’t know, maybe some slippery spots on the track?” the world champion joked about the special Monaco mode that some teams, such as Williams and the Racing Bulls, used on Sunday to open up a pit stop window for their second car by deliberately slowing down.
Overtaking impossible: “So it doesn’t matter what you do.”
Verstappen is not surprised, given his own lead in the final stages: “You can’t overtake here anyway, so it doesn’t matter what you do. One stop, ten stops, it doesn’t matter. Even at the end, when I was in front, my tires were completely shot—and still you can’t overtake. I think these days, with an F1 car, you can just about overtake a Formula 2 car here.”
Behind him, the leaders Lando Norris, Charles Leclerc, and finally Oscar Piastri bunched up before Verstappen finally turned into the pits for his second mandatory stop, finally clearing the way for the top three: “I had a big gap behind me. Like I said, I probably could have made four stops and it wouldn’t have changed anything—that’s Monaco. Qualifying is extremely important here,“ Verstappen makes no secret of where he lost the race.
”Unless something extraordinary happens, you don’t usually get any further forward. And if you just make your pit stops, you stay where you are – and that’s exactly what happened today,” he said, showing little surprise at the outcome of the race.
“I don’t think we had the pace to keep up with the guys at the front either, because whenever I tried to stay with them, my tires degraded too much and started to grainy. Fourth place was definitely the maximum today.” At least without banana peels…
