Monaco - Red Bull got so f***ing lucky.

I fear I must apologise for my lack of Blogs from Malaysia through to Spain I have not much time to do them and other things have come up with made it not possible for me to blog as regularly and as extensively as I'd like. And for that I apologise again and I will continue to try my best in bringing you epically long winded and dull but (i hope) loveable blogs.

It was one of the all time great races. It was had everything. Glory, disaster, magnificent driving, talking points to stretch back years to come and it all came in the 2 square miles of the most glamorous place on earth. The 2011 Monaco Grand Prix, won by Sebastian Vettel should have been remembered in my mind as one of the greatest things I have ever seen.

Before we do anything else lets look at the top ten as it stands of writing:

1. Vettel
2. Alonso
3. Button
4. Webber
5. Kobayashi
6. Hamilton
7. Sutil
8. Heidfeld
9. Barrichello
10. Buemi

Lets look at the positives, before going into the inevitable negatives:

• Jenson Button drove a better race than he ever has, not put a foot wrong and had a potentially brilliant strategy ruined only by circumstance.

• Vettel and Alonso overcame problems including slow pit stops, chaotic accidents and very slow out-laps to also put in great drives and were lucky not to be canon fodder for Button on lap 73 or so.

• Schumacher and Hamilton and as extremely entertaining battle, 2 brave overtakes and fair fighting which in the end would be pivotal to the rest of the action in the race, for better or for worse.
• Kobayshi had his best ever race finish and finishing in front of Lewis Hamilton's Mclaren.

• Good to hear that Petrov and Perez are doing fine and I fully expect to see them both fit and ready for the next race in Canada.

• There was plenty of overtaking, in places on the track where you would not neccesarily see it normally, for example Tabacc (Massa on Rosberg and Hamilton on Petrov), Grand Hotel (Schumacher on Hamilton and Rosberg) and even Mirabeau (Kobyashi on Sutil).

• And I must say, magnificent coverage and even better commentary from Brundle and DC.

It was a race of high drama, massive danger and even sights that Red Bulls's pit crew are not unflapable. The pit stops in general were not great if your name was not Jenson Button. There were mistakes and long stops all down the field and it really did shuffle the pack around in an exciting way which made guessing the result of the race virtually impossible. Eddie Jordan (who normally is a first class clown in my book) described as slack and I really think it was that but it did give us some great on track action.

However I fear that I have to get into the negatives as unfortunately they did outweigh the positives in the race:

First of all the two great showdowns of the weekend were taken away from us. The respective incidents of Perez and then the huge pile up in the swimming pool both brought out red flags. While they both appeared to be the right move it to took the opportunity for 2 great fights between Red Bull, Mclaren and Ferrari away from us and let luck fall into the lap of the championship leader. If Hamilton had been able to do his run at the end of Q3 I really do think he will have taken the front row and that would have given both him and Button a great chance at a Mclaren 1-2 but it was not to be and in the race Button, who comfortably the fastest man on the track due to safety car caused by Glock's and Schumacher's retirements the red flag from the messy accident at the Swimming Pool meant he could not captalise on Alonso's and/or Vettel's tires that looked like they were due to just give up on either one of them any second.

Then there was sheer quantity of what I would describe as dangerous driving. Rather go into them in full detail I shall give a brief summary to the way I read each moment:

• Paul Di Resta hitting Algersuari into Mireabeau: The penalty was fair as even though he was just lapping the Toro Rosso he should have been that agressive into the hairpin and it really did cost him points.

• Hamilton hitting Massa at the same place, it was difficult as Massa did cause an avoidable when he went down Mark Webber's inside as well but the ensuing contact and the fact the whole incident ended up with Massa's retirement I have to say all in all it was fair for Hamilton to get the drive through.

• Kobyashi's moment with Sutil was a racing incident and it was as simple as Kobyashi going in too deep and forcing Sutil a bit wide but there was no investigation involved and rightly so.

• The accident involving Sutil, Petrov, Algersuari and Hamilton was a big one as Sutil's puncture caused Hamilton to slow down and Algersuari go into the back of Hamilton before Petrov followed him and nearly injured himself.

• And finally we have Hamilton and Maldonado. Maldonado simply turned in on Hamilton after not expect the Mclaren driver to be there. It was a racing incident and the 20 second penalty even though it did not make a difference to the overall result seeing as he was the last man on the lead lap I don't see that as being just by the stewards.

To continue on with the un-just penalty I don't mind that Hamilton was fairly miffed. What he said after the race was very wrong. I know he used the Ali-G quote as a joke but the fact he was so angry and labelled the race stewards (Alan McNish being the driver representative) as jokes shows that despite he still one of the best racing drivers in the world and in realistic terms the only person left with a hope in hell of catching the Vettel/Red Bull combination in the championship race he needs to calm and not let his emotions get the better of him or otherwise he'll lose a lot of fans and let the haters (whom probably have enough ammunition already) to get closer to being proved and considering his is my favorite driver I just wish that he'd have thought about what he said because now even though he cleared the air with the Marshall's as I was writing this he has given himself a reputation as being a bit of a whinny little turd.

However the most GRRRRR worthy thing about the race came when the Red Flag came out and the cars were allowed to to be repaired and tires were allowed to be changed. This took away the titanic crap that Button, Vettel and Alonso could have had over the last few laps and potentially given the more deserving podium of Button from Alonso from Vettel. Red Bull made the mistake of putting on the wrong tires but it enabled them to be the first team to legally (not counting Perez in Melbourne) do a 1 stop race. It should not have worked as his tires would have 'fallen off the cliff' in a few laps. Vettel is getting Schumacher esque luck in that Red Bull it is that, as opposed to only having the 2nd fastest car in terms of race pace, that is going to win him the World Championship I think.

Before we leave lets look at the top 5 in both the drivers and constructors championships:

Drivers:

1. Vettel: 143 points
2. Hamilton: 85
3. Webber: 79
4. Button: 76
5. Alonso: 69

Constructors:

1. Red Bull Renault: 222
2. Mclaren Mercedes: 161
3. Ferrari: 93
4. Renault: 50
5. Mercedes: 40

Thank you if you have made it this far and as I like to do I would like to leave you with a thought which will not please any of you Hamilton haters but it is true:

Hamilton has always been the fastest driver when it comes to racing at Montreal, he has not once been beaten for pace and if he were not an utter clown in 2008 he would have never been beaten at Montreal.