'Surprising that Verstappen was so satisfied with third place'

Martin Brundle was somewhat surprised by Max Verstappen's satisfied attitude after the race. In his column for Sky Sports Brundle explains why he thinks Verstappen was so relaxed and why he feels sorry for Charles Leclerc.

Verstappen is struggling

For Verstappen, it was a difficult weekend in Monaco. In each session, he struggled against his teammate Sergio Perez and it was no surprise that he qualified behind the Mexican. In the race, Perez took the win due to a good strategy from Red Bull, whereas Verstappen had to settle for P3.

''In third place was a surprisingly content Max Verstappen, presumably because he had his current championship rival Leclerc behind him. Max was missing a fraction all weekend for some reason and was behind Perez in that respect. A one-three for Red Bull was a very solid result for the team given that Ferrari were clearly faster'', said the former F1 driver.

Bad luck for Leclerc

The pain is more with Charles Leclerc. He did everything right on Saturday by taking pole and driving away well at the start, but a dramatic strategy from Ferrari worked out badly for the Monegasque so he had to settle for P4.

''You must feel sorry for local boy Charles Leclerc, he aced pole position and comfortably led the race only for strategy to consign him to fourth place. Pitting on lap 18 for intermediates, then again three laps later for slicks with a confused radio message meaning he had to wait briefly for his teammate Carlos Sainz to receive his slicks in a double-stacked pit stop. Therefore, he was initially undercut by Perez into second place and then delayed into fourth by the second stop,'' said Brundle. After that miss by Ferrari, Leclerc was unable to return to the front and lost precious points to Verstappen in the title race.