Ferrari's Charles Leclerc wins home F1 race in Monaco, breaking the 'curse' (2024)
Ferrari's Charles Leclerc won the Monaco Grand Prix on Sunday with a flawless lights-to-flag victory, securing one of the most coveted trophies in Formula 1 for the first time in his career.
It was a poignant triumph for Leclerc, who grew up on the streets of Monaco and has fallen short of winning his home race so many times, due to a mix of misfortune and mistakes, that F1 commentators had dubbed it the Leclerc “curse.”
“Yes! Yes! Yes!” Leclerc exclaimed to his team after taking the checkered flag. “F---ing finally!”
Finishing behind Leclerc were McLaren's Oscar Piastri in second place, Ferrari's Carlos Sainz in third place and McLaren's Lando Norris in fourth place.
Leclerc had the speed over his rivals for most of the weekend and qualified on pole position Saturday, ahead of a street race where overtaking is notoriously difficult. He controlled the pace Sunday and the lead was never seriously challenged in the Grand Prix.
With fewer than five laps to go, Leclerc had built a lead and could taste victory, telling his team on the radio, “I’ll just bring it home.”
Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, the defending triple world champion, finished sixth after struggling with the handling of his car all weekend and qualifying sixth. Verstappen still leads the 2024 world championship with 169 points, but Leclerc has narrowed the gap at 138 points with plenty of races remaining this season.
It was Leclerc’s first F1 race victory in nearly two years, when he won the Austrian Grand Prix in 2022. The Monegasque driver signed a contract extension with Ferrari earlier this year and will be joined next season by Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton.
The now-broken Leclerc home “curse” included two previous Monaco F1 pole positions that he failed to convert into wins — one in 2021, when a gearbox failure caused by a qualifying crash meant he failed to start the race, and one in 2022, when a strategy error by Ferrari sent him tumbling down the order.
“No words can explain that,” Leclerc said on the ESPN broadcast after parking his car, adding that it means more after his near misses. “It’s such a difficult race. … It means a lot obviously. It’s the race that made me dream of becoming a Formula 1 driver one day.”
The Monaco Grand Prix marked three races in a row where Verstappen’s dominance was challenged. Earlier this month he lost the Miami Grand Prix to Norris, and held off a charging Norris to win the subsequent race in Italy by less than 1 second.
The race was initially red flagged after a crash-filled start that included a three-car incident on the opening lap, putting Red Bull’s Sergio Perez and Haas drivers Kevin Magnussen and Nico Hulkenberg out of the race. It restarted after officials cleaned up the debris on the track and was accident-free on the second attempt.
Also on the first lap, Alpine’s Esteban Ocon damaged his car and was forced to retire after attempting an aggressive move on his teammate Pierre Gasly and making contact, before Gasly criticized Ocon for it on team radio.
The now-broken Leclerc home “curse” included two previous Monaco F1
Monaco F1
The Monaco Grand Prix (French: Grand Prix de Monaco) is a Formula One motor racing event held annually on the Circuit de Monaco, in late May or early June.
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Monaco_Grand_Prix
pole positions that he failed to convert into wins — one in 2021, when a gearbox failure caused by a qualifying crash meant he failed to start the race, and one in 2022, when a strategy error by Ferrari sent him tumbling down the order.
Leclerc finished runner-up to Max Verstappen in the 2022 World Drivers' Championship. In 2024, Leclerc won the Monaco Grand Prix, becoming the first Monégasque driver to win the race in 93 years.
The result made Leclerc the youngest-ever champion of the main support series for F1 at 19 years and 356 days old, along with being the first rookie to win since Nico Hulkenberg back in 2009.
Max Verstappen has won 60 Grands Prix during his Formula 1 career, which is nearly 31% of the total number of races he has started. He is quickly becoming one of the best drivers ever seen on an F1 grid, and the statistics are also starting to prove that.
In 2018, in his first F1 Monaco Grand Prix, Leclerc was taken out of the race going into the Nouvelle Chicane as Brendon Hartley of then Toro Rosso hit the back of him, and a year later, he was eliminated in the first part of qualifying and retired in the race due to contact with the wall at Rascasse.
The Monegasque driver has been able to welcome a new family member: Leo. The Ferrari driver is not talking about a baby, but a puppy. The images shown by Leclerc include how little Leo is happily marching through the grass.
Ferrari is co-owned by Dutch holding company Exor, which is majority-owned by the billionaire Agnelli family, and Piero Ferrari. The Italian entrepreneur Enzo Ferrari died in 1988, having founded the car brand in 1939 after leaving Alfa Romeo. Enzo Ferrari's son Piero inherited a 10 per cent stake.
They won the Constructors' Championship (which was formed in 1958) sixteen times, in 1961, 1964, 1975, 1976, 1977, 1979, 1982, 1983, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2007 and 2008.
From the late 1940s to the early 1970s, Ferrari competed in sports car racing with great success, winning the overall World Sportscar Championship (WSC) twelve times. Ferrari cars (including non-works entries) won the Mille Miglia eight times, the Targa Florio seven times, and the 24 Hours of Le Mans nine times.
However, if the Monegasque driver had his way at the start of his F1 career, he would be racing with a different number. “I wanted number seven. I wanted number 10, but it was taken," Leclerc revealed. "I finally ended up with number 16, because one plus six equals seven and I am born the 16th of October.
Leclerc is the only driver to finish in the top four of every race this season so far, while teammate Carlos Sainz is the only driver on the grid not named Verstappen to win a race. Think about it: A 26-year-old Leclerc claiming Ferrari's first championship in close to two decades could have biblical implications.
Leclerc's long-cherished dream of competing in Formula One became a reality when he joined the Sauber F1 Team (now known as Alfa Romeo Racing). His rookie season was characterised by impressive performances and an ability to consistently outperform his car's expectations.
With bonuses and endorsem*nts factored in, Verstappen's net worth soared to approximately $165.5 million. According to Forbes, his annual contract with Red Bull alone amounts to a staggering $43 million. But despite Verstappen's immense wealth, he's not the richest F1 driver in history.
SHANGHAI, April 21 (Reuters) - Triple world champion Max Verstappen won Formula One's first Chinese Grand Prix in five years on Sunday with McLaren's Lando Norris finishing a surprise second to deny dominant Red Bull the one-two.
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