Rosberg wins in Monaco as Mercedes civil war begins

The Monaco Grand Prix truly ignited the battle for the 2014 world championship. In the all Mercedes fight for the title Lewis Hamilton looked to be in the ascendancy. Having taken the points lead in Spain after his fourth successive win it was crucial for Nico Rosberg to strike back around the streets he won on last year.

Rosberg duly took the victory from pole position, holding off sustained pressure from Hamilton for most of the race. He made a perfect start and despite fuel issues during the middle part of the race kept it all under control to take his second win of the year and hit the front once again in the championship battle.

If Rosberg had lost out to Lewis for the fifth time in a row, then it was going to start looking rather sketchy as to whether he’d ever manage to take the fight to Lewis. Have no doubts it was essential that he won this race.

That meant he had to lead out from the start, the best place to do that is to start at the front of the grid. He did this under, shall we say, controversial circumstances. Every time the Formula 1 circus arrives in Monaco there is mention of how Michael Schumacher supposedly parked his car at La Rascasse in 2006 and blocked the track to prevent Fernando Alonso setting a better time during qualifying.

No wonder there was immediate suspicion on Rosberg as knowing he was down on his own provisional pole lap he locked up going into Mirabeau and ran down the escape road bringing out the yellow flags. The pressure certainly seemed to be getting to him at this point, but suddenly that pressure was transferred to Hamilton.

Hamilton was behind Rosberg on the track, and after the first laps had been set was just 0.059 slower. On the second run he was quicker at the first sector but backed off as the yellow flags waved for his team mates car, Hamilton’s chances of securing the most important pole position of the year were over. Immediately he thought it had been done on purpose and from there his head seemed to go, this was a race he desperately wanted to take pole at and win to demonstrate his dominance over Rosberg as he had intimated in the lead up. That it seemed like he'd been wrong in his efforts to do so struck him hard.

My initial reaction to the incident was it was just a mistake, a driver pushing too hard knowing he was slower than his first lap and knowing that Lewis often pulls it out of the bag on his final attempt, just like he’d done in Spain. In fact Rosberg has had previous at messing up his final attempt in qualifying a few times this year, perhaps it was no surprise it should happen again.

I still think it was just a mistake, I don’t think Rosberg is the kind of driver who would do this kind of thing deliberately. But when you look at the replays it does at least look like he unsettles the car with a few movements of the steering wheel before he actual locks up his left front tyre. He just manages to guide the car down the escape road, but even with that most drivers would know that would bring out the caution flags.

Only Rosberg knows but on this occasion you have to give him the benefit of the doubt especially with regards to what has happened in qualifying in previous races this year. What it did do is ignite the fire that’s been smoking away for the past few races as the Mercedes drivers have come to realise this title is going to be fought by themselves.

Hamilton particularly seems to be letting the pressure begin to get to him despite his four wins this year. He knows he’s the quicker of the two drivers, but he knows that with the advantage Mercedes have Rosberg is always going to be there. So when on the occasions that Rosberg is quicker, and amplified by Lewis’ non-finish in Australia, he knows Nico will stay close to him on points and on weekends such as this can retake the points lead.

Lewis looked just utterly downcast, he obviously feels something dodgy went on despite the stewards exonerating Rosberg from any wrong doing. He even went so far to say that these two karting buddies were no longer friends. He ignored Rosberg completely after qualifying and after the race too. Nico is taking a more light hearted approach and saying they are still friends but this battle is just going to get more and more intense.

I hope Lewis doesn’t let it get to him too much as in reality this title is his for the taking. He is the better race driver, but he has in the past sabotaged himself by not letting his driving do the talking. Monaco could well have been a pivotal weekend in the championship.

Lewis’ driving can be affected by his emotions, when he’s in a good place he’s brilliant, when he’s not it can start going wrong. He can’t let any paranoia creep in. He already started questioning the team on the radio for not pitting him earlier when the second safety car came out for Adrian Sutil’s crash. But Mercedes have a policy of favouring the lead car as most teams do, something he did actually acknowledge after the race.

Rosberg needed to steal the advantage this weekend and he did just that. He was fast all through practice and looked in general to have the edge over Lewis. He took pole position, he made a perfect start and never let Lewis get to him despite two safety car periods. In the closing stages Hamilton got something in his eye which cost him several seconds and left him vulnerable to attack from the Red Bull of Daniel Ricciardo, who hounded him to the flag to make up the podium. Even during this period of the race Hamilton was more concerned with how far away Nico was rather than the fast catching Australian.

Whatever though, Rosberg took a fully deserved victory for Mercedes and with it there will now be two very distinct teams within the Mercedes garage. Canada can’t come soon enough for the next chapter in this title thriller.

Final Result:

1. Nico Rosberg - Mercedes

2. Lewis Hamilton - Mercedes

3. Daniel Ricciardo - Red Bull

4. Fernando Alonso - Ferrari

5. Nico Hulkenberg - Force India

6. Jenson Button - McLaren

7. Felipe Massa - Williams

8. Romain Grosjean - Lotus

9. Jules Bianchi - Marussia

10. Kevin Magnussen - McLaren

11. Marcus Ericsson - Caterham

12. Kimi Raikkonen - Ferrari

13. Kamui Kobayashi - Caterham

14. Max Chilton - Marussia

R. Esteban Gutierrez - Sauber - Accident

R. Valtteri Bottas - Williams - Power Unit

R. Jean-Eric Vergne - Toro Rosso - Exhaust

R. Adrian Sutil - Sauber - Accident

R. Daniil Kvyat - Toro Rosso - Exhaust

R. Sebastian Vettel - Red Bull - Turbo

R. Sergio Perez - Force India - Accident

R. Pastor Maldonado - Lotus - Fuel pump

all photo's taken from autosport.com