Charles Leclerc Finally Wins His Home Monaco Grand Prix

Charles Leclerc can finally say that he won his home race, as he triumphed at the 2024 Monaco Grand Prix.

The Monegasque driver has a special relationship with the Circuit de Monaco, since it's a place where he grew up and place that made he fall in love with motorsport and Formula 1.

Since he's been in F1, and driving for Ferrari, Leclerc had multiple chances to win the Monaco Grand Prix. Prior to the race in 2024, he started from a pole position twice, and given that it's almost impossible to overtake around Monaco, he was naturally the top favourite twice.

Still, the victory avoided him, but that was only until 2024, when Leclerc finally crossed the finish line first in Monaco, winning his home race for the first time in his career.

The race started terribly for both Haas cars, as after Nico Hulkenberg and Kevin Magnussen were disqualified from the qualifying, they were out of the race already after Turn 1.

It came after the Danish driver hit Red Bull's Sergio Perez from behind, resulting in all three drivers ending their race only seconds after it started.

On top of that, Carlos Sainz had an issue, after running side-by-side with McLaren's Oscar Piastri, which forced him to stop his Ferrari on the track in Lap 1. However, since the race was red-flagged because of the three-car crash, and the starting order was reinstated, the Spaniard's race was saved.

The first lap was eventful also when it came to fights between teammates, as Alpine's Esteban Ocon attempted to overtake Pierre Gasly, resulting in an incident that saw Ocon also abandon his race on Lap 1.

After the incident, Alpine's Team Principal, Bruno Famin, was heard speaking on the French television, saying that the incident will have consequences, as it was unreasonable to do such move.

After a few minute wait, the race could continue, or rather, start again, as there wasn't much of the race distance completed, and with the red flag giving all drivers a chance to change their tires, seemingly the only possible race-changing factor was taken away.

That proved to be more and more truthful with every lap as Leclerc managed his pace just enough not to allow McLaren's Lando Norris a free pitstop by opening a 20-second gap to fifth George Russell in Mercedes.

Although there seemingly was one moment when the British driver could have tried to dive into the pits, only a few laps later, Max Verstappen in Red Bull, who wasn't happy with his car in Monaco, proved that even if Norris got to change his tires, he probably wouldn't challenge for a podium.

The Dutchman was chasing Russell by 2 seconds per lap, but once he caught him, he wasn't able to make any move, and as a result, the Top 10 at the end of the race looked exactly the same as when the race started.

Leclerc finally won a race on his home soil, with Piastri and Sainz completing the podium. Russell placed fifth while Verstappen finished sixth. Lewis Hamilton completed the Top 7, with the fastest lap, as the British driver was the last driver in the same lap as the leading Monegasque.

After them it was Yuki Tsunoda in RB, who collected some valuable points for his team, and the same applied to ninth Alex Albon in Williams. Despite the first-lap collision, Gasly finshed the race in P10.