Hamilton scores first Monaco Pole

Hamilton scores his first Pole in Monaco

Lewis Hamilton scored the crucial pole position in the F1 Grand Prix at Monaco

The qualifying in the F1 race at Monaco is very important given the twisting nature of the street circuit which makes overtaking difficult. The pole sitter generally wins the race. In the last 10 races, 9 times the driver has won from the pole.

There were spots of rain at the start of Q3. So Lewis Hamilton immediately started on his first qualifying lap in the Q3 and set a time of 1m 15. 304 for the provisional P1 slot. His teammate Nico Rosberg was further 0.136 seconds down. Sebastian Vettel was the only other driver to be in the 1m 15s. However, in the final run in Q3, Lewis Hamilton bettered his own lap time and scored a 1m 15.098 seconds. His teammate Nico Rosberg could not better his initial time and came in second and was 0.342 seconds behind him after setting a time of 1m 15.440s.

Sebastian Vettel of Ferrari was 0.751 seconds behind with a time of 1m 15.849s. Surprisingly Daniel Ricciardo of Red Bull came in 4th with 1m 16.041s. Daniil Kyvat was 5th with 1m 16.182s.

Kimi Raikkonen of Ferrari was 6th and more than half a second behind his teammate. Raikkonen scored a 1m 16.427s. He was followed by Sergio Perez of Force India in 7th with a time of 1m 16.808. Perez had done only one run where he was provisional P6 which was subsequently pushed down to P7 during the second run by other drivers.

Carlos Sainz was 8th with a time of 1m 16.931 seconds. Pastor Maldonado of Force India was 9th after he set a time of 1m 16.946s. Max Verstappen, the youngest driver in the F1 history came in at P10 with a time of 1m 16.957s.

Romain Grosjean of Lotus was 11th with a time of 1m 17.007 seconds. He was followed by Jenso Button of McLaren with 1m 17.093 seconds. Nico Hulkenberg of Force India was 13th as he was a further .1 seconds down on Jenson Button. Felipe Massa of Williams qualified on 14th with a time of 1m 17.278 seconds.

Fernando Alonso of McLaren had bad luck as his car stopped with a potential engine problem. His time was good enough for 15th position and qualify for the Q2. However, since he couldn’t participate in Q2.

Fernando Alonso was followed by Felipe Nasr in 16th. Valtteri Bottas of Williams was 17th and was followed by Marcus Ericsson in 18th.

As expected the two Marusia cars of Will Stevens and Roberto Merhi came in at 19th and 20th out of 20 cars in the Monaco F1 Grand Prix qualifying. They were the only two cars who were in the 1m 20s.

Anything is possible in Monaco as a number of cars hit the barriers and retire from the race. Last year, Marussia's driver Jules Bianchi had finished in 8th position and had earned their only points till date. Because of that points finish, they got an estimated 20 million pounds which helped them find a buyer and stay in this business. It is sad that Jules Bianchi had an accident at Japan in F1 race in 2014 and is fighting for his survival. His parents are now prepared to give up as the cost of medication is simply way too much for anyone to bear. Also Bianchi is not showing much improvement. It is time to remember him, so the Manor Marussia team has distributed a wrist band in Bianchi's name.

Lets hope tomorrow's race is entertaining without any injury to anyone.