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Monaco Grand Prix: Grim and bear it for Kimi - and Jenson's self-destruct Button

Oooh, Kimi. Whichever way you look at it, this year’s Monaco Grand Prix was a more grim than glamour for the Ferrari driver – and that’s even though he finished second.

By way of contrast, it was a showcase for Raikkonen’s team-mate Sebastian Vettel who, despite being a quadruple World Champion, came into this race weekend having won in the Principality just the once.

READ MORE: Monaco GP race report

The rest of the race was… well, classic Monaco. Lots of barrier roulette and not so much overtaking – a glorious spectacle for those who love big cars going quickly on narrow roads, a borefest for those who see Monaco as a museum of a circuit.

Kimi the curate’s egg

Raikkonen’s race weekend was, as the saying goes, a curate’s egg – good in places.

He drove the wheels off his Ferrari in qualifying, and really looked to have the measure of Monaco this year – a Fabergé egg rather than a plain old boiled offering.

Fast-forward to race day and Raikkonen started well, quickly building a gap over Vettel, as the pair steamed off into the distance for the first few laps.

But there was trouble brewing chez Kimi. He was fast, but not fast enough.

As his first race stint passed, he began to struggle a little on his ultrasoft tyres and Vettel, ominously, was sitting less than 1.5 seconds behind him on track (pictured).

Raikkonen, as is normal for a team’s leading car, was pitted first, to get rid of those worn ultrasofts. It wasn’t the fastest of pitstops – and speed was crucial, with Vettel so close.

Out on track, meanwhile, Vettel was in clean air and putting in some superb laps on 34-lap-old tyres, knocking more than a second a lap off what he’d been able to do when stuck behind Raikkonen.

Raikkonen rejoined the track and ran straight into traffic, costing him more valuable time.

By the time Vettel pitted, just a few laps later, the damage to Raikkonen’s race had been done. His stop was quicker than Raikkonen’s but those hot laps in clean air had been enough to catapult Vettel into the lead.

And that, as far as the race win was concerned, was that.

But did Ferrari engineer Kimi’s demotion to second place?

Tinfoil hats, get yer Ferrari tinfoil hats

The evidence for the prosecution of Ferrari goes something like this: They pitted Raikkonen before Vettel, even though wise heads had said that pitting second was the better option.

And the Ferrari strategists timed the pitstop so that Raikkonen would be released into traffic, behind slower cars that would impede his progress.

That traffic, coupled with a slightly slow pitstop and the time it takes to get new tyres working properly, meant Vettel could ‘overcut’ his team mate.

Which, of course, he did.

The evidence for the defence goes a bit like this: Vettel was as fast as fury and would have won whenever Kimi pitted.

Now, it was in Ferrari’s interests to get Vettel into that first position – those extra seven points for a win could well prove crucial in the Drivers’ Championship, come the season end.

And there’s no doubt that Raikkonen exiting the pits, straight into traffic, looked suspicious. F1 teams have many strategists and many computers to avoid just such a scenario, though it’s not always possible to engineer the ‘perfect’ pitstop.

But, after a blazing qualifying session on Saturday, Raikkonen just didn’t have the pace on Sunday.

Tellingly, thanks to what we know about Vettel’s pace relative to his team-mate, it’s more than likely that Raikkonen would have found himself in second place regardless of Ferrari’s pitstop strategy.

Amid all the grins and glamour of Monaco, post-race Raikkonen stood out with a face like thunder, as if someone had pooped in his swimming pool.

While it’s easy to assume he was raging at Ferrari’s strategy, it’s equally valid to assume he was furious at himself, comprehensively outperformed by that trickiest of competitors, the team-mate.

Conspiracy? No, not for me. Happy coincidence? For Ferrari, undoubtedly; for Kimi, somewhat less than happy.

If you still believe Ferrari engineered the whole thing, then tinfoil hats are available from the usual stockists – 50p for a plain one or £35 for one with a Ferrari logo. That’s F1.

The self-destruct Button

Monaco marked Jenson Button’s return to F1 for a single, glamorous, race, as the stand-in for Indy 500 newbie Fernando Alonso.

He played a blinder in qualifying, given that he’d not driven a 2017-spec car until arriving in Monaco.

Saturday saw him qualify in 9th, ahead of team-mate Stoffel Vandoorne. Unfortunately, a whole bunch of engine parts on the (Alonso) car had to be replaced, and Button (pictured) was hit with a 15-place grid penalty as a result.

That, then, was his weekend knackered. Starting at the back of the field – actually, from the pit lane – on a track with negligible overtaking opportunities, in a car that has coughed and spluttered all season, on old tyres (the rules meant he had to start with the set he qualified on) Button knew he really had to just sit back and enjoy the experience.

But the racer in him wasn’t having any of that…

He pitted after the first lap to get his mandatory stop out of the way while he was still at the back of the field, the plan being to pick up places where he could and hope for a safety car to bunch up the field later.

Unfortunately for Button, Pascal Wehrlein in the Sauber was up to the same thing. He was released into Button’s path in the pits, and handed a five-second penalty as a result.

But he held Button up for lap after frustrating lap and being Monaco, there was little Button could do about it.

That is, until Lap 60, when Button saw an opening as the Sauber made its way around Portier, just before the Tunnel entrance.

Wallop. The opening vanished and Wehrlein’s car was thumped into the barriers, and came to rest on its side, balancing on its left wheels.

Wehrlein – still recovering from a back injury he received some months ago in the Race of Champions – was trapped against the barrier.

There were deeply uncomfortable moments while Wehrlein’s wellbeing was checked. No screens showed the impact and there was radio silence until, finally, it was clear the young German was fine.

His team had, of course, radioed to ask if he was ok and he’d replied, laconically: ‘Yes, it would be better if I could jump out…’

Farther along the track, Button’s battered McLaren was being parked up, his race – and, this time almost certainly, his career as an F1 driver – over.

Button did add one more bit of interest to the day though…

Button in pee-1

During the formation lap, Button received a live good-luck message from Alonso, who was preparing for his maiden Indianapolis 500 appearance (pictured).

It was a nice enough message, ending with: ‘Take care of my car!’

Button, in his own way, replied: ‘I’m going to pee in your seat…’

Which he may well have done, as he watched Wehrlein being propelled head-first into the barriers at Portier…

There wasn’t much else in the way of radio action – Max Verstappen vented his fury as pitstops conspired against him and Raikkonen maintained a stoic silence.

It was a good race for Daniel Ricciardo, the Red Bull driver benefiting from the pitstop phase and finishing in third for the second race in a row.

For Lewis Hamilton, seventh place was not so good but reasonable damage limitation, having qualified a lowly 13th after a Saturday pockmarked with tyre problems and errors.

He radioed his team as he finished, saying: ‘The battle’s not over boys, we’ll take these points.’

A few others whose day didn’t go so well included Sauber’s Marcus Ericsson, who crashed out under the safety car; McLaren’s Stoffel Vandoorne, who slid into the barriers while being passed by Sergio Perez at the restart; and Daniil Kvyat, whose race ended with a collision at Rascasse – also with Perez.

Next up, Canada – once everyone has stopped talking about Alonso’s memorable Indy 500 appearance.