2017 Monaco GP interactive lap times and fastest laps

2017 Monaco Grand Prix

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Did Sebastian Vettel win the Monaco Grand Prix by extracting two laps of superior pace on old tyres?

Or did Kimi Raikkonen lose the Monaco Grand Prix because his team brought him in too early for his first pit stop, leaving him in a position where his team mate would inevitably lap quicker than him despite having older tyres?

Monaco GP qualifying in pictures
This isn’t just a question about how the Monaco Grand Prix was won or lost. It also asks a question about whether Ferrari are giving both their drivers an equal chance to win the championship, or discreetly giving preferential treatment to Vettel.

At the point the two Ferrari drivers pitted Vettel was able to lap quick enough on worn ultra-softs to beat Raikkonen’s pace on new super-softs. Raikkonen’s last lap before pitting was a 1’17.0. By the time Vettel pitted he’d reduced his lap times by a whopping 1.8 seconds.

Before Raikkonen pitted, Vettel was less than a second behind. It’s hard to avoid the impression Raikkonen was holding Vettel up. Nonetheless Ferrari gave him the priority on pitting first, which usually is an advantage.

On this occasion it didn’t work out for him. Raikkonen wasn’t the only driver to fall victim to this: Daniel Ricciardo also got ahead of his team mate by using the ‘overcut’.

Still, it would theoretically have been possible for Ferrari to leave their drivers out until the ultra-soft tyres degraded to the point that the new super-soft tyres would have been better. Is the reason they did that because they wanted to help Vettel get ahead? Or were they anxious about leaving both drivers vulnerable to a Safety Car deployment?

If they’d had to stack both drivers during a Safety Car period, they would probably have lost a one-two. That was most likely what pressed them into pitting when they did, which gave Vettel a window of opportunity he exploited brilliantly.

2017 Monaco Grand Prix lap times

All the lap times by the drivers (in seconds, very slow laps excluded). Scroll to zoom, drag to pan and toggle drivers using the control below:

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2017 Monaco Grand Prix fastest laps

Each driver’s fastest lap:

RankDriverCarFastest lapGapOn lap
1Sergio PerezForce India-Mercedes1’14.82076
2Sebastian VettelFerrari1’15.2380.41838
3Kimi RaikkonenFerrari1’15.5270.70739
4Daniel RicciardoRed Bull-TAG Heuer1’15.7560.93651
5Lewis HamiltonMercedes1’15.8251.00554
6Lance StrollWilliams-Mercedes1’16.0751.25571
7Kevin MagnussenHaas-Ferrari1’16.3131.49344
8Max VerstappenRed Bull-TAG Heuer1’16.3291.50956
9Valtteri BottasMercedes1’16.4391.61922
10Esteban OconForce India-Mercedes1’16.4821.66252
11Daniil KvyatToro Rosso-Renault1’16.5391.71943
12Felipe MassaWilliams-Mercedes1’16.5431.72350
13Jolyon PalmerRenault1’16.6141.79455
14Carlos Sainz JnrToro Rosso-Renault1’16.6491.82939
15Stoffel VandoorneMcLaren-Honda1’16.6651.84545
16Marcus EricssonSauber-Ferrari1’16.8292.00939
17Jenson ButtonMcLaren-Honda1’16.9122.09247
18Romain GrosjeanHaas-Ferrari1’17.0952.27545
19Nico HulkenbergRenault1’17.8853.06513
20Pascal WehrleinSauber-Ferrari1’18.0343.21425

2017 Monaco Grand Prix

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Author information

Keith Collantine
Lifelong motor sport fan Keith set up RaceFans in 2005 - when it was originally called F1 Fanatic. Having previously worked as a motoring...

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24 comments on “2017 Monaco GP interactive lap times and fastest laps”

  1. They would also have been vulnerable to Bottas and Verstappen if Räikkönen would not have been able to clear the traffic they were coming up to quickly. It was definitely the safer choice to put Räikkönen when they did in order to make sure they get the 1-2. There was the risk that Vettel overcuts but that was of course not much of a concern. In the end it was still very close between Vettel and Räikkönen when Vettel came back onto the track so it was not obvious that his strategy was much better.

  2. The decisive difference was that when Ferrari pitted Räikkönen he came out in traffic, behind backmarkers he had previously lapped and had to do it all over again. When Vettel pitted he came out ahead of those backmarkers. Ferrari should have waited another lap or preferably two before they pitted Räikkönen, therefore it’s either a very sloppy call by Ferrari or a very clever one, you pick your choice.

    1. Seems Lewis Hamilton is of the same opinion:

        1. And Wolff, Lauda and Horner disagree, they all say that VET won by pace

          1. To say that he won on pace is a meaningless statement. With the strategy chosen for VET, he would obviously have more pace than RAI for a short during the pitstop sequence. I am a professional mathematician, so I’ve carefully analyzed the timing & scoring data. In fact the overcut strategy gained position or significant time for almost everyone who used it. Vettel’s gain was therefore nothing special. The icing on the cake is that Kimi’s stop was at least 0.3s slower (one source says 0.5s). That’s a lot.

    2. VER started a domino effect, BOT had to react, and RIC closed on the Ferraris before his stop. VER became faster than RAI/VET too, where he had no traffic. This meant Ferrari needed to react.
      RAI came out behind those backmarkers because he lost too much time getting them the first time around. If VET can run in his wake with less than a second of a gap, RAI should certainly be able to get close enough to get the blue flag system working on the backmarkers. Instead he stayed 2 laps outside that window, losing a massive amount of time. This meant Ferrari had no option to bring in VET, because the RIC treath, and they had to do something to cover all bases. VET put in a few very fast laps once he got clean air, and the rest doesn’t matter.

      1. No, no, no! That Merc and RBR would have been able to undercut is fast becoming an urban legend. First of all, FP showed that Ferrari were substantially quicker than everyone else on race pace (longer stints). Second, qualifying demonstrated beyond a shadow of a doubt that while Ferrari (Räikkönen) were able to set their best times after a single qualifying lap, both Mercedes and RBR required a slow w/u lap followed by a normal/fast w/u lap before trying to set a fast lap and that the first was not usually their fastest but the second. This is what you saw at both the start and restarts – Ferrari immediately pulled out a gap and then managed it as traffic allowed (plus safety car deployments) and traffic is the reason the gap came down, not Merc or RBR being intrinsically faster.

        Lewis Hamilton himself said: “In strategy, that [Vettel’s victory] doesn’t happen. The leading car, it is very hard for him to get jumped unless the team decide to favour the other car, so it’s great for him [Vettel].”

        This Ferrari achieved by pitting Räikkönen (without advance warning while Vettel was given due notice several laps in advance) so that he came out in backmarker traffic and lost time to Vettel, who Ferrari kept out on track at the front of the field in clear air. By the time Vettel pitted five laps later, he had built up a big enough lead over Raikkonen to switch tyres and resume the race ahead of his teammate. Very cleverly done by Ferrari and not illegal!!!

        Now, do your homework before you invent any more impossible scenarios!

        1. Sorry! “while Ferrari (Räikkönen) were able to set their best times after a single *qualifying* lap” should of course have been “while Ferrari (Räikkönen) were able to set their best times after a single *w/u* lap”.

        2. did Ferrari ask kimi to pick up the pace cause he was going to pit or not

          1. @lucifer, no they did not. IIRC he was more than halfway round the lap when they just called “Pit, pit, pit”. Vettel was told he had a couple of laps before he would be pitted. Again, Ferrari have done nothing illegal and the way they managed the switch was very clever. Their only problem is that Kimi was visibly furious (in a Finn, that’s fury – they can be very scary as you never know if they’re going to explode or not) from the moment he climbed out of the cockpit until the conclusion of the victory ceremony. He hardly congratulated Vettel, which in itself is very telling as they’re very good friends privately, or the team representative. Never anger a Finn! They are slow to take offense but once aroused, their anger lasts a lifetime.

    3. Ferrari own theI think RAI fans have it wrong.
      Let me explain. RAI was struggling to build gap. At one point RAI to BOT gap was 7sec and then it came down to 4sec.
      When VER and then BOT pitted, Ferrari did not know undercut does not work. So as a rule they pit leader who at that point is RAI. But as it turns out RAI on SS was slower than VET on US tyres.
      We saw same with RBR. VER and RIC switched.
      Now imagine Ferrari not responding to BOT and undercut actually works. Both BOT and VER would be ahead.
      Now imagine Ferrari pitting VET instead of RAI and undercut works, VET would gain plave on RAI. Fans will again be unhappy.
      Get hatred out and use Brain to think. team and driver and can do whatever

      1. Yes, as you say, use your brain to think! I happen to be a professional mathematician, so I’m used to doing that occasionally. Except for hypothetical traffic issues, an undercut was NEVER a serious possibility in Monaco this year. There was insufficient tire degradation. The preferable strategy throughout the field was the overcut. I analyzed the timing & scoring data thoroughly. You can do the same rather than making up ridiculous scenarios.

    4. RAI outlap was 1:19.518, VET outlap was 1:18.65, Looking at the chart after the pits, RAI didn’t lose too much time in traffic.

      By the way, RAI inlap was 1:34.039, VET inlap was 1:32.673

  3. The inference that Vettel suddenly upped the pace by 1.8 seconds because he was being held up is patently nonsense. Up until that point, Raikkonen would have had no incentive to push very hard as he was out front simply controlling the race, so doing 17.0s wasn’t a big deal. It’s not as if he himself couldn’t have found significant lap time had he been told to push before his stop. As it was, he was told to ‘box’ halfway round his lap, seemingly in response to Bottas/Verstappen having stopped themselves, so he had no chance to build a proper gap. Vettel then had the luxury of three extra laps on the better tyre. From the moment that Ferrari pitted Raikkonen it was a foregone conclusion – a complete sham – I was actually surprised by how close Kimi was to Vettel after his stop. Considering Vettel’s championship challenge, I understand Ferrari’s decision, but a great driver like Raikkonen deserves better.

    1. Sorry man, but you are just wrong. Thinking that RAI had pace in hand in the final stage of the 1st stint, but did not push, is just not right. VET was around 1 s behind him, everybody knew the pit stop window is open, there is no way RAI was not pushing. He should have opened the gap of 3 seconds in clear air, and the race would have been his, but he just was not fast enough. Two laps VET did after RAI pitted where just phenomenal, I mean just look at the average pace of the other drivers at the moment. VET was always going to wait for RAI to pit and try the overcut, the only way for RAI to stay ahead was probably to go long, long into stint, and make sure that VET lost his tyres as well, but then they would probably be vulnerable to those behind. I think the overcut was the way to go, but looking at RAI pace at the end (1.17s), VET did 1.16.1 on his first lap on SS, so the undercut was possible as well, particularly if taken into account that VET would push even more on fresh tyres. Either way, VET was too close to RAI and much faster, be it on fresh SS (RAI) vs used US (VET) or the other way around, there was no way that he stays ahead apart from stacking them together.

    2. The inference that Vettel suddenly upped the pace by 1.8 seconds because he was being held up is patently nonsense.

      Raikkonen was less than a second ahead of Vettel before he pitted. Drivers are generally advised to keep a buffer of at least two seconds over a rival to be safe from the undercut.

      If Raikkonen had the pace you believe he had he should have used it to build that margin over Vettel. But he didn’t. Vettel closed the gap at will after lap 29 when it became clear the pit stops were coming.

      1. Usually, your team will tell you to push before a stop. If Kimi didn’t know he was about to stop, he’d simply maintain a steady pace as planned before the race. And Why didn’t Ferrari bring in Vettel the lap after Kimi’s stop?

        1. Ferrari have said that Kimi stopped on the lap that they had planned before the race, he will know what lap he is on from the pitboards. He asked if it was time to stop so clearly knew that his stop was near, and I am sure that his team would have told him when first Verstappen and then Bottas stopped.

          Kimi is an experienced driver he should be aware that he was in the pit stop phase of the race. If he had any more pace this was the time when he should have pushed. As Keith says if he didn’t want to be at risk from either the undercut or overcut he should have built a gap to Seb, he failed to do so.

          Ferrari (and both drivers) had said had said earlier in the weekend that there drivers were free to race. Giving Seb the opportunity to try to make either the overcut (or alternatively an undercut) work is consistent with that, preventing him from trying is not.

        2. If Kimi didn’t know he was about to stop

          Has he said that was the case?

          Why didn’t Ferrari bring in Vettel the lap after Kimi’s stop?

          Because there was no urgent need to bring him in. As I wrote above there was an obvious need to bring one of the two cars in and Ferrari did this. As we all know it is usually strategically advantageous for the lead car to come in first, which is also what Ferrari did. But after that there was no imperative to bring Vettel in immediately.

  4. There is a way to get this data via excel?

  5. In the whole analysis you missed the consideration of backmarkers and the time of pitting.. so please do that..!

  6. I think RAI fans have it wrong.
    Let me explain. RAI was struggling to build gap. At one point RAI to BOT gap was 7sec and then it came down to 4sec.
    When VER and then BOT pitted, Ferrari did not know undercut does not work. So as a rule they pit leader who at that point is RAI. But as it turns out RAI on SS was slower than VET on US tyres.
    We saw same with RBR. VER and RIC switched.
    Now imagine Ferrari not responding to BOT and undercut actually works. Both BOT and VER would be ahead.
    Now imagine Ferrari pitting VET instead of RAI and undercut works, VET would gain plave on RAI. Fans will again be unhappy.
    Get hatred out and use Brain to think.

    1. I would have told kimi to push and stop 1-2 laps later to avoid traffic.

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