Upcoming Events
Menu
Dutchman Larry ten Voorde (Schumacher CLRT), who started from pole position, became the only three-time winner of the Porsche Supercup in Monaco at midday on Sunday, without ever being troubled by his great rival Harry King. A talented young South African, Keagan Masters, was also on the podium, behind the untouchables.
It was another great race, the third in a row after the F3 and F2 races, to round off this morning’s curtain-raiser to the 81st Formula 1 Grand Prix de Monaco in style. There were some great battles, with Marvin Klein (Schumacher CLRT) managing to briefly occupy 4th place, but he had to concede defeat in the end to another Dutchman, Kas Haverkort (Uniserver by Team GP Elite).
The history of the Porsche Supercup will remember that King, winner last year in the Principality, finished 1.2 second behind ten Voorde, recruited this winter by the Schumacher CLRT team originally founded by French driver Côme Ledogar. Alessandro Ghiretti (8th), the third driver in the Schumacher CLRT combo, rounded off the demonstration of French teams and drivers combined, as well as Victor Bernier, the rookie from the Martinet by Alméras team (10th).
In the Porsche Supercup, created over 30 years ago and run as a curtain-raiser to 8 F1 Grands Prix a year, mainly in Europe, ten Voorde, twice champion of the discipline (2020, 2021), is now the only driver to have triumphed three times in the Principality. That’s one more victory than his compatriot Michael Bleekemolen (2007, 2008) and Monegasque Stéphane Ortelli (2000, 2001).
Thanks to a finale worthy of roulette at Casino de Monte-Carlo, Australian Zak O’Sullivan (ART Grand Prix), starting from 15th on the grid, won the main Formula 2 race on Sunday morning, beating Frenchman Isack Hadjar (Campos Racing) who ran a perfect race from start to finish. The podium was completed by Estonian Paul Aron (HiTech) at the end of an eventful race.
Dutch poleman Richard Verschoor (Trident) got off to a very good start, ahead of Hadjar and Aron, but the other Frenchman entered, Victor Martins (ART GP), placed on the front row next to Verschoor, was unable to take advantage and found himself 15th at the end of the 1st lap. There were then a number of good battles between some very hot drivers in the middle of the field, such as Argentina’s Franco Colapinto Italy’s Andrea Antonelli and Englishman Oliver Bearman, who has already scored points in F1 the day he replaced Carlos Sainz at Ferrari for the Saudi Grand Prix.
It wasn’t until the first series of pit stops that the standings were turned upside down, with some choosing to stop earlier, like Verschoor, and others later. But the Dutchman finally stopped twice, the second on lap 29, and was forced to retire with a heavy heart due to a mechanical problem. With a dozen laps to go, the way was clear for Hadjar, who held off Aron to the end and thought he had the race won when he started the 41st and penultimate lap.
But then two of his rivals from the back of the grid, Joshua Durksen and Roman Stanek, collided on the Beau Rivage climb, triggering a virtual safety car (with no safety car on track), which forced everyone to slow down… while O’Sullivan rushed into the pits to comply with the regulations by making his compulsory pit stop to change tyres. When he emerged from the pits, he was ahead of the rest of the field, slowing down on the straight. Bingo!
On the podium, Hadjar gradually regained his smile, but he was furious at this twist of fate. He is the moral winner of this race, five years after the late Anthoine Hubert and three years after Théo Pourchaire from Grasse, who remains, until further notice, the last French winner to date in an F2 race in Monaco.
Italy’s Gabriele Mini (Prema Racing), who started from pole position, completed a historic double by winning the Formula 3 Monaco Grand Prix for the second year in a row, a few hours before the 81st Formula 1 Grand Prix de Monaco.
A member of the Alpine Drivers Academy, Mini was never troubled in a race slowed three times by the exit of the safety car. He finished right at the top of the podium, accompanied by Australian Christian Mansell (ART Grand Prix), who is not related to Nigel, the F1 world champion, and by Briton Luke Browning (HiTech), another candidate for the F2 crown at the end of the season.
The race, scheduled to last 27 laps, was slowed down three times, firstly when Charly Wurz hit the safety rail at the Portier turn, in Lap 1. Then when Nikola Tsolov, winner of the Sprint Race on Saturday, and Noel Leon, the Mexican of Van Amersfoort Racing, collided at the Mirabeau bend on lap 21. Sami Meguetounif, the only Frenchman in the race, was unable to pass and ended up against the safety rail, his car then being lifted by a crane.
The third race incident saw Dutchman Laurens van Hoepen, 3rd in Saturday’s Sprint, get into the rail on his own at Bureau de Tabac, just before the S de la Piscine, on lap 24, which caused the safety car to come out again.
The safety car returned to the pits just before the 27th and final lap, allowing Mini to cross the finish line at full speed and take full advantage of this second consecutive F3 victory on Monegasque soil.
This has only happened twice in the history of this very important race for a young driver: in 1961 and 1962, for Peter Arundell (Lotus), then in 1981 and 1982, for Michel Ferté (Martini).
Charles Leclerc really wanted this pole position for the 81stFormula 1 Grand Prix de Monaco. The Monegasque achieved it after a masterclass in qualifying, on Saturday, in his Ferrari. He will be the great favourite at 3pm on Sunday in this prestigious race that he has never yet won.
Since free practice on Friday, everything has been falling into place. Best time in the 2nd session, beating Max Verstappen’s sensational pole position of 2023, Charles continued his preparation work early on Saturday afternoon, again finishing at the top of the timesheet. But there was still room for doubt, as the Dutchman, a three-time reigning world champion, was only two-tenths off the Monegasque.
The qualifying session, which was eagerly awaited by an enthusiastic crowd, allowed Leclerc to build up his pace slowly but surely, while one elimination followed another. Starting with Fernando Alonso (Aston Martin) and Sergio Pérez (Red Bull), who were ruthlessly ejected in Q1. There were still two Alpines in the race, but Esteban Ocon didn’t see Q3, while his compatriot Pierre Gasly, who set a sensational 5th fastest time in Q2, boosted the morale of the Franco-English team in one fell swoop. At that point, ten drivers were within half a second of each other, having all done better than Verstappen’s pole in 2023.
An amazing Q3
Q3 was sumptuous, as expected, with ten drivers at the top of their game, capable of going very fast without breaking anything. Leclerc set the first reference time of 1:10.418, ahead of Piastri, Verstappen and Sainz, before everyone returned to the pits for a mini-break, giving the spectators a chance to catch their breath.
Then came the grand finale, the last attempt, the final lap of an extraordinary session, concluded by the long-awaited pole of the local hero, in 1:10.270. Just one tenth off the absolute record set at Circuit de Monaco in 2019 by a Lewis Hamilton who was then on another planet (1:10.166), in a Mercedes team at the height of its domination of F1.
250th pole for Ferrari
For the scenario to be perfect, a round number was needed: it was the 250th pole position for a Ferrari in F1 since 1950, and it made Charles Leclerc the second most successful Ferrari driver in this very special qualifying exercise, with 24 pole positions in all. That’s one more than the legendary Niki Lauda for the Scuderia, and far fewer than the unrivalled Schumi (58 for Ferrari, out of a total of 68).
Behind two mixed front rows, Leclerc-Piastri and Sainz-Norris, at 3pm on Sunday, there will be a Mercedes (Russell) on the third row, alongside a Red Bull (Verstappen), and three surprise guests around Hamilton (7thfastest today): Yuki Tsunoda (8th) in his Racing Bull, Alex Albon (9th) in his Williams and Pierre Gasly (10th) in his Alpine. That’s seven teams out of ten represented at the top of the grid, so that all the fans can be happy. We cannot wait for Sunday!
19-year-old Briton Taylor Barnard (AIX Racing), who is making his F2 debut and had not yet managed to score a point in 2024, made the most of the reversed grid for the Sprint Race on Saturday, which was marked by several race incidents and interrupted by a red flag.
Thanks to his 10th place in qualifying, Norwich-born Barnard, winner of just one F3 race last year (10th in the F3 championship), was on pole position for the 30-lap Sprint. He got off to a very good start and never relinquished the lead, with Brazilian Gabriel Bortoleto (Invicta) and Norwegian Dennis Hauger (MP Motorsport) behind him all the way to the chequered flag.
The best lap was set by Italian prodigy Andrea ‘Kimi’ Antonelli (Prema Racing), who failed to finish on the podium but scored a few points, while Frenchman Victor Martins (ART GP) and Dutchman Richard Verschoor (Trident) were eliminated prematurely.
Martins didn’t even see the Beau Rivage climb, being sandwiched at the start by two of his rivals and thrown against the rail at Sainte-Dévote, where he opened up his front end. Spaniard Josep Maria Marti crashed out of the S de la Piscine on lap 6, causing the Safety Car to come out. And Verschoor, after a touch on lap 12, had to return to his pits, from where he left 22nd and last.
In the final incident, which was not serious for the drivers, championship leader Zane Maloney was caught out by the braking of Indonesian driver Kush Maini at the Rascasse bend, hit him from behind and spun, causing a small traffic jam and the red flags coming out. The race restarted at 3.13pm, for just 6 laps, and the Top 8 remained unchanged, despite Antonelli’s best efforts, with Frenchman Isack Hadjar (Campos Racing) in 8th place at the end.
Everything will return to normal on Sunday at 9.40am for the long race (42 laps), with the starting grid in the order determined by Friday’s qualifying. And two Frenchmen at the top of the grid, Martins (2nd) and Hadjar (3rd), determined to beat poleman Verschoor.
The battle of the chiefs will take place on Circuit de Monaco from 4 p.m. to see who will start from pole position on Sunday, at the 81st Formula 1 Grand Prix de Monaco. The 3rd free practice session saw Charles Leclerc, fastest in his Ferrari, confirm the very favourable impression already given on Friday. He will just have to be quicker than the last two world champions, Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton.
With a time of 1:11.369, the Monegasque, in search of a first podium finish in his homeland, did almost as well as he did in Friday’s 2nd session, just one tenth behind, and saw the inevitable Verstappen, who set the 2nd fastest time, just two tenths behind the Scuderia driver, come back into his rear-view mirror. This promises to be the case in qualifying, where a third driver, the veteran Hamilton (Mercedes), will be looking to get onto the front row, along with one or the other of his two young rivals.
Last year, in qualifying, the Red Bull driver took all the risks and set a time of 1:11.365 to take pole. This time has already been beaten on Friday by Leclerc, and there is no doubt that it will be beaten again later today. There could still be a surprise in store, as the top ten finishers in this 2nd session finished within 7 tenths of each other, between Leclerc and Fernando Alonso (Aston Martin), who set the 10th fastest time.
One thing is certain: the Ferraris have everything they need to continue their domination of the Monaco weekend, with perhaps a small margin of comfort over the Red Bulls, the Mercedes and the McLarens of Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris, or even the Aston Martin of ‘Nando’, the two-time Spanish world champion.
Finally, one or two teams from the second half of the field could manage to qualify for Q3, the final act of “quali”, if the session is even more eventful than expected. In that case, we’ll have to keep an eye on Yuki Tsunoda’s Racing Bull, Kevin Magnussen and Nico Hülkenberg at Haas. After all, anything is always possible at Monaco, especially on Saturday…
The ART Grand Prix team, a benchmark in the categories for young drivers aspiring to F1, managed to place two of its three drivers on the podium in the Formula 3 Sprint Race at the 81st Formula 1 Grand Prix de Monaco: Bulgaria’s Nikola Tsolov won, ahead of Germany’s Tim Tramnitz (MP Motorsport) and Tsolov’s team-mate, Dutchman Laurens van Hoepen.
The French team’s third driver, Christian Mansell, was eliminated on the first lap when five cars piled up on the track near Casino de Monte-Carlo, causing the yellow and then red flags to come out. It took the Automobile Club de Monaco (ACM) marshals around twenty minutes to remove the cars and debris from the pile-up, before the race resumed.
There were still 22 laps to go, for 25 of the 30 cars entered this week, and Tsolov, 17, in his Alpine-badged single-seater, opened up a gap on Tramnitz. He then drove relatively quietly to a prestigious victory, 4 seconds ahead of the young German, the podium being completed by van Hoepen.
This Sprint Race was run on an inverted grid, for the top 12 drivers in qualifications. There was no miracle for the favourites in the long race on Sunday morning at 8.00am, and all the major players finished grouped between 7th and 11th place, including Swede Dino Beganovic and Briton Luke Browning, and above all Italians Leonardo Fornaroli and poleman Gabriele Mini. They will both start from the front row early Sunday morning.
The best Porsche Supercup driver of the 21st century, Larry ten Voorde (Schumacher CLRT), once again outclassed his rivals in qualifying on Friday. Twice crowned champion, in 2020 and 2021, he will start from pole position on Sunday at midday (17 laps), with his best enemy, Briton Harry King, at his side.
The British driver from Lechner Racing will be looking to repeat last year’s success, when he finally beat ten Voorde who had started from pole! The two great rivals were on another planet on Friday, and nobody was able to dislodge them from the top of the timesheets during 30 minutes of an intense, fierce session, which was briefly interrupted by a red flag, then ended prematurely by another red flag.
Ten Voorde set a time of 1:32.846, better than last year at the same time, in the same conditions, and King came within two tenths, with a time of 1:33.037 at the very end of the session, just before the final red flag. On the second row of the grid, there will be the surprising Keagan Masters (Ombra), a 21-year-old South African, and a Dutch rookie in the person of Kas Haverkort (Uniserver). Two surprises, but they didn’t steal their second place, given the very high standard of these qualifications which turned into a street fight.
On the French side, in addition to the pole position achieved by the Schumacher CLRT structure, originally set up by driver Côme Ledogar, there were other satisfying results, such as the 5th place on the grid achieved by Marvin Klein, ten Voorde’s team-mate in the French team. A product of the French Porsche Carrera Cup, Klein can aim for a podium finish on Sunday, behind the untouchable ten Voorde and King, who will be tough to overtake..
The tifosi can rest assured that they will sleep well tonight. The 2nd free practice session of the 81st Formula 1 Grand Prix de Monaco saw Charles Leclerc, fastest in his Ferrari, do better than three world champions: Lewis Hamilton, fastest in the 1st session, Fernando Alonso and Max Verstappen. That’s 12 world championship titles altogether!
Saturday’s qualifying session promises to be sumptuous. The top four drivers in this 2nd session, all grouped within half a second, still have their work cut out. They didn’t spend the whole session on soft tyres in order to set the best possible time, and they ended the session preparing for the race on medium or hard tyres. And one thing is certain: the suspense is going to be total on Saturday at 17:00.
With a time of 1:11.278, the Monegasque, who has never yet stood on the princely podium in his native country, did better than Max Verstappen last year in qualifying (1:11.365), when he took a sensational pole position by taking all the risks, and converted it into his second win in Monaco the following day.
That was the main lesson to be learned from Friday’s race: the Ferraris are ready, efficient and fast, and Charles can aim for pole on Saturday, but he’s not the only one. Lewis Hamilton, seven-time world champion and three-time winner in Monaco, showed once again, after his best time early in the afternoon in the 1st session, that he really is a force to be reckoned with this weekend.
Sir Lewis took 2nd place in this 2nd session, less than 2 tenths behind Leclerc, driving slightly faster than Alonso and Verstappen. The Mercedes is much more efficient on the streets of Monaco than on the very fast circuits at the start of the season, where it was unable to keep up with the infernal pace of the Red Bulls, McLarens and Ferraris. And McLaren remains in the hunt, thanks also to the talent of its young drivers Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri. They are both dreaming of springing a surprise on Sunday. Or perhaps in qualifying on Saturday? Wait and see…
Dutchman Richard Verschoor (Trident) will start from pole position for Sunday’s main Formula 2 race, the curtain-raiser to the 81st Formula 1 Monaco Grand Prix. However, the two French drivers competing in F2 did not disappoint in qualifying on Friday: Victor Martins (ART Grand Prix) will be next to him on the front row, and Isack Hadjar (Campos Racing) just behind, on the second row.
Martins and Hadjar had shone in Thursday’s one and only free practice session run on wet tyres. It took just a few thousandths of a second (27 to be precise) for Verschoor to claim pole position, with a best lap of 1:21.283 in Group A. Slightly faster than the Frenchman who clocked a 1:21.310 in Group B, a few minutes later.
Martins will therefore have a great opportunity on Sunday to finally launch his 2024 season, having only managed to score 9 points in eight races. Behind him will be Estonian Paul Aron (HiTech) and Czech Roland Stanek (Trident). A little further back, Briton Oliver Bearman, who has already scored points in F1 (replacing Carlos Sainz at the last minute at Ferrari), will be less well placed, on the 6th row of the grid.
Hadjar, lying in ambush on the 2nd row of the grid, just behind Verschoor, will have to keep a close eye on his mirrors with, in order, Argentinian Franco Colapinto, Italian prodigy Andrea ‘Kimi’ Antonelli, backed by Mercedes F1, and two Brazilians, Gabriel Bortoleto and Enzo Fittipaldi, grandson of double World Champion Emerson, in the 7Os.
This grid is valid for Sunday morning (42 laps, 9.40am), but not for Saturday afternoon’s Sprint Race (30 laps or 45 minutes) where the grid will be reversed for the top ten qualifiers.
After eight races in 2024, the leader of the FIA Formula 2 Championship is Zane Maloney (Rodin Motorsport). He could do no better than 7th in Group B qualifying. He will therefore start from the 7th row of the grid on Sunday and will have to put in a great effort to finish on the podium.
