Monaco Grand Prix FP1 Results: What Happened During First Practice?

Your Sports Illustrated guide to FP1 of the 2023 Monaco Grand Prix.

After a long wait after the cancellation if the Emilia Romagna Grand Prix, F1 racing returns to the Monaco Grand Prix. It's a tight and dangerous track where setup is key. Being a street circuit there's plenty of vertical movement in the tarmac, and setup is obviously the riding focus today.

Red Bull's Sergio Perez was the first to hit the Monaco track as the hot sun beat down on the tarmac. Followed by an Alfa Romeo, the RB19 once again exploited the use of flow-vis paint with them bringing a change to this track to allow them to tighten their turning circle. 

Max Verstappen quickly complained about the clutch in the tight pit lane as he entered the track for the first time, but the conversation today revolves around Aston Martin, with Fernando Alonso looking for his first win at a track he has considerable prowess and him quickly topping the timesheets with the hard tyre. 

The focus returned to Verstappen however, as he complained about the car bottoming out and being very difficult to control in the high-speed sectors. It's fair to say he wasn't happy with the setup, but bringing this up so early in the weekend will allow the Milton Keynes crew to fix this before the cars are plunged into parc ferme conditions. In fact, the Dutch driver was so unhappy with the car, he asked to pit. It was fixed to a degree, but getting to the bottom of it will have to come tomorrow.

Of course, a main plot point of this weekend is the upgrades Mercedes have brought to their W14, and Lewis Hamilton quickly gave his fans hope with him putting in a very fast lap, leading the drivers on hard tyres. His teammate George Russell wasn't so happy in comparison, with him returning to the pits within the first 15 minutes of the event with the front suspension being his engineer's main focus. 

"The rear's to weak," Russell told his engineers over the radio.

Williams' Logan Sargeant suffered an issue with his car, with it sounding as though he had a potential problem with the differential. It's early days so there's plenty of time to fix this. But time in the pits is time not on the track, something that I'm sure the inexperienced Sargeant wants right now. 

Haas' Nico Hulkenberg span the car, hitting the safety barrier and bringing the session to a red flag. He was able to limp the car back to his team, but the barrier repair meant cars were forced back to the pits for a short break.  

A little more racing and changing of setups, Alex Albon crashed his Williams causing the second red flag of the session. Unfortunately for him, it looks like a lot of damage and I'm not sure he'll be returning to FP2 later today. 

That brought the surprisingly thrilling FP1 to an end. 

Monaco Grand Prix FP1 Results 

1. Carlos Sainz
2. Fernando Alonso
3. Lewis Hamilton
4. Sergio Perez
5. Charles Leclerc
6. Max Verstappen
7. Lando Norris
8. Esteban Ocon
9. Lance Stroll
10. Alex Albon