Red Bull domination! FP1 summary and results from Monaco

Red Bull dominated the opening session of the Monaco Grand Prix weekend. Ricciardo was fastest in FP1 this morning with a 1:12.126 on the new hyper soft tyres. His team-mate, Verstappen, finished second just 0.154 seconds behind.

Lewis Hamilton was fastest, but only for a couple of laps in a fairly incident-free session by Monaco standards. He finished the session in third. Ferrari had a steady morning but it’s possible they could be hiding pace. 

Valtteri Bottas was over 1 second off the pace in claims that Mercedes could actually be third best this weekend. He was running with heavy fuel loads towards the end of the session. 

Fernando Alonso was missing for most of the session. He was in the pits after less than half an hour with McLaren stripping down his car. It’s believed he had a brake issue. He made it back out on track with just under 10 minutes remaining. 

Toro Rosso had an impressive start as Hartley went out to answer some critics. He was running as high as 6th for periods of the session but dropped down towards the end. 

Gasly made it into 14th. However, the Monaco track is a leveller for those with less power in their engines. 

The hypersoft, making their debut, is definitely faster. At one time, Hamilton used the hypersoft and immediately beat the Red Bull time. As we thought, they’re going to make a huge difference this weekend. 

Home driver Charles Leclerc finished the session in 16th.