Was Raikkonen sacrificed for Vettel?

Lewis Hamilton was emphatic in the aftermath of the Monaco Grand Prix. Sebastian Vettel beat Ferrari team-mate Kimi Raikkonen to victory and extended his lead over Hamilton to 25 points in the Formula 1 world championship. But Hamilton was left in no doubt as to the reason Vettel won this race, coming from behind at a circuit where overtaking is near-impossible.

"It's clear to me Ferrari have chosen their number one driver, so they're going to be pushing everything to make sure Sebastian will get the maximum on all of his weekends," Hamilton said. "With the strategy, it's very hard for the leading car to get jumped by the second car unless the team decide to favour the other car, so that's very clear."

Ferrari has a history of favouring one driver over another in F1. Michael Schumacher was undisputed number one during his long and successful spell at Maranello; Fernando Alonso was clearly favoured over Felipe Massa during their time with the Scuderia - even during a period when team orders were outlawed.

Raikkonen has prior experience of being both the beneficiary and the benefactor in Ferrari's historical approach to F1 title battles.

He benefited from Ferrari's decision to favour him over Massa during the final four races of Raikkonen's world championship-winning season in 2007. The following year he was forced into the supporting role for Massa's thwarted championship ambitions.

But in neither case was it pre-ordained before the season that one driver would make way for the other. Raikkonen is a world champion, a winner, one of the most naturally gifted drivers ever to grace Formula 1. In his mind, he is here to race to win for himself, as much as for Ferrari.

He certainly would not expect to be sacrificed for the benefit of Vettel just yet, only six grands prix into a 20-race campaign.

Raikkonen's dejected body language after a race in which he finished second to Vettel, having started from pole and led for 34 laps, suggested he was deeply unhappy with the way the Monaco Grand Prix unfolded.

Certainly, if Ferrari is hell-bent on Vettel winning this championship, bearing in mind he arrived in Monte Carlo already 55 points clear of Raikkonen after five races, then it would make perfect sense to sacrifice Raikkonen's personal ambitions for the 'greater good'.

This would be the best way to boost Vettel in his battle with Hamilton, who trailed by just six points after the Spanish Grand Prix but struggled badly for speed amid more Mercedes set-up trouble on the ultra-soft Pirelli tyres in Monaco. Hamilton failed to make Q3 and was forced into a damage-limitation run to a lowly seventh in the race.

But is Hamilton really correct in what he says about Ferrari favouring Vettel in Monte Carlo?

Or did an innocent combination of circumstances ultimately conspire to deny Raikkonen a first grand prix victory since Australia 2013?

RAIKKONEN IN CONTROL
The gap between Raikkonen and Vettel early on

Raikkonen has shown inconsistent form since returning to Ferrari in 2014, obliterated by Alonso that season and by Vettel the following year. But he showed signs of renewed life in 2016 by besting Vettel in qualifying through most of the second half of the campaign, and scoring a greater proportion of Ferrari's points in the championship compared to the previous two seasons.

Raikkonen had trouble setting up the SF70H correctly in the first two races of 2017, but he was much happier in Bahrain, came close to snatching pole in Russia, and felt he had a real chance in Spain, too, but for some silly mistakes at the crucial moment in Q3.

In Monaco, Raikkonen finally pulled things together to bag his first pole position since the French Grand Prix of 2008. When he converted that pole position into an early lead at the start, and third-placed Valtteri Bottas began falling back into the clutches of the Red Bull drivers, it looked as though there was little other than mechanical misfortune that could deny Raikkonen victory.

Raikkonen quickly settled into his rhythm and built an advantage of more than two seconds over Vettel, and more than six over Bottas, over the first 13 laps.

There wasn't much to choose between Raikkonen and Vettel across much of the first stint, with Raikkonen a couple of hundredths of a second faster per lap on average than Vettel over the first 21 laps of this 78-lap race, while Bottas gave away two tenths per lap and gradually fell out of the picture.

It was close, but the Iceman looked in control.

RAIKKONEN BEGINS TO LOSE HIS GRIP
The gap between the leaders as Raikkonen starts to struggle

Raikkonen's pace mysteriously dropped off thereafter, by three tenths per lap on average between laps 22 and 33. Vettel's pace made a similar drop, while Bottas picked up speed to the point where he was more than a tenth per lap quicker than both Ferraris, with Max Verstappen's Red Bull coming up even faster from behind.

Raikkonen lost time lapping Jenson Button's McLaren and Pascal Wehrlein's Sauber, both cut adrift from the pack by making pitstops at the end of lap one. Raikkonen caught Button at the end of lap 25 and didn't make it past until Button moved aside at the exit of the Swimming Pool at the end of lap 27. It took another lap to negotiate Wehrlein.

This explains three troubled laps, but it doesn't explain the rest. Vettel suggested both he and Raikkonen began to struggle with the rear tyres on their Ferraris, but Raikkonen felt his car was in good shape through the first stint.

"The car was behaving well - not really having any issues," Raikkonen said. "We had to take it a little bit easier here and there but nothing to complain [about] really. The most lap time we lost behind the lapped traffic."

At the point his pace began to fall away, Raikkonen had been on the verge of extending a big enough gap over sixth-placed Carlos Sainz Jr to get in and out of the pits without fear of getting stuck behind the Toro Rosso.

The Ferrari's loss of pace thereafter closed this window temporarily and bunched the top five cars together. Red Bull seized the opportunity to try to vault Verstappen ahead of Bottas in the pits. Verstappen pitted on lap 32; Bottas responded next time around.

Both came out behind Sainz, with Bottas still ahead of Verstappen, and neither set spectacular lap times as they closed on to the Toro Rosso, nor once it pitted out of their way and they negotiated the Button/Wehrlein battle.

Ferrari called Raikkonen in for what would be his sole pitstop on lap 34. He came out ahead of Sainz, but stuck behind Button and Wehrlein once again. Raikkonen lost the best part of a second to Vettel when you compare their respective out-laps, as he was forced to renegotiate this traffic.

Ferrari said Raikkonen's pitstop timing was pre-planned, insisted its drivers are free to race, and that it "wouldn't do anything as stupid as sacrifice one car by [deliberately] putting it into traffic", according to a team spokesman. "It's totally unfair and crazy and stupid to slow him down deliberately, because you risk losing the one-two."

THE STRATEGIC TIDE TURNS

Raikkonen led Vettel by 1.238s when Raikkonen headed to the pits at the end of lap 34, but trailed his team-mate by 2.058s by the time Vettel had completed the out-lap from his own solitary pitstop at the end of lap 40.

While it's true Raikkonen lost more than eight tenths to Vettel negotiating traffic on his out-lap, the main reason for the reversal of positions was Raikkonen's relatively underwhelming in-lap - 1m34.039s compared with Vettel's 1m32.673s effort - and the fact Raikkonen gave away almost two tenths of a second per lap on average to Vettel over five laps while running on new super-softs compared to Vettel's used ultra-softs.

"The lead car normally gets priority, so going in the pits first is what you like to do because you are sooner on fresher tyres," Vettel said. "It's probably one of the rare occasions where the 'overcut' turned out to be the positive, so I'm really glad I made that work.

"There was no plan of any team orders. I can understand that Kimi's not happy, I would feel 100% the same."

A similar strategy also worked out for Hamilton in his battle through the lower order, and for Red Bull's Daniel Ricciardo, who utilised remaining life in his used ultra-softs on a clear track to jump Bottas and Verstappen for third. Verstappen was initially furious at this outcome, but as Red Bull boss Christian Horner explained, it's impossible to please both drivers in such a scenario.

"We could have pitted Daniel first, but if he had a clean out-lap he could have undercut Max, and then you are having another explanation," Horner said. "This race is always going to throw up those kinds of scenarios."

The anomaly in this equation was the strong performance of the used ultra-softs on Vettel's and Ricciardo's cars.

Ordinarily, newer sets of the slower tyre tend to allow cars to go quicker than those still on well-worn sets of the faster compound - provided the pure lap time difference between the two isn't too great.

But Monaco is a particularly low-energy circuit for the tyres, with a super-smooth surface and no high-load corners, so generating grip from the tyres tends to be more problematic than wearing them out or overheating them.

If you can keep the tyres in their optimum temperature range and not slide around too much, you should be in reasonably good shape even on well-used rubber, especially given the durability of the current range of Pirellis.

All the indications from practice suggested the ultra-soft could do an entire race distance. Pirelli saw barely any degradation in the tyre after 25 laps, and Ricciardo had spoken after qualifying of the potential power of the 'overcut' strategy.

There was no guarantee Vettel and Ricciardo could out-do their rivals once into clear air, but that's exactly what happened.

VETTEL UNLEASHES HIDDEN PACE
The gap as Vettel eases clear of his team-mate

"I just tried to push as hard as I can and wait for the call to box," Vettel said. "When I came out ahead of Kimi I was surprised myself. Those couple of laps were really crucial. I was pushing flat out. I had better laps than in qualifying.

"I was trying to go as fast as I can because for me it means staying ahead of Valtteri. I was surprised I could take so much pace from the car and was [then] going even below the [1m]16s.

"There seemed to be a second tyre somehow, because the laps before I was struggling as much as Kimi with the rears. You can say it worked well to stay out longer, but I think if you were looking at it before the race then you couldn't predict.

"I can understand Kimi's not entirely happy. He drove well in the first stint, you get the message to go in, you do the pitstop and then you push. Obviously, it's a bad surprise when somebody comes out ahead."

What's puzzling is Raikkonen's lack of pace on worn ultra-softs before the stops, even allowing for traffic. Pitting him to cover Bottas and Verstappen makes a certain degree of sense, except when you consider how difficult tyre warm-up was on both compounds throughout the weekend and the ultra-soft's obvious durability, which would negate the advantage of pitting first.

Ferrari says it was also trying to cover Ricciardo strategically by leaving Vettel out, but Ricciardo was too far back, and both Ferraris too quick on new super-softs, for the Red Bull to be a real factor, which suggests Ferrari could have called Vettel in sooner.

But this is where, as Ferrari put it, Vettel was "free to try to fight for the lead" by running longer than Raikkonen and doing everything in his power to make up time. It's also true that better relative laps around his pitstops, avoiding the traffic he encountered, plus better pace on new super-softs while Vettel was on his charge, would have given Raikkonen a shot at salvaging this race.

The fight seemed to drain from Raikkonen once reality dawned on him. He was slow and steady throughout the remainder of the race, never looking like troubling Vettel either side of the safety car period called after the Button/Wehrlein battle eventually got physical.

Vettel dealt well with the restart to re-open a gap of almost 2.5s heading into the final 11 laps, and he reeled those off untroubled to record Ferrari's first Monaco victory since his hero Michael Schumacher triumphed here in 2001.

It was the perfect result to boost Vettel's championship bid, also allowing Ferrari to assume control in the constructors' standings. Vettel was naturally all smiles afterwards, having delivered Schumacher-esque fast laps at the crucial strategic moment; Raikkonen looked furious, as though struggling to compute defeat.

For Hamilton, it was clear Ferrari simply sacrificed Raikkonen's race to boost Vettel's championship aspirations, but Hamilton's Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff wasn't so sure.

"It wasn't clear how the tyre would perform," Wolff reckoned. "The super-soft was not quick enough and Sebastian was able to pull out some stunning laps on the used ultra-soft, and that gave him the opportunity over Kimi.

"I don't think they saw it coming. At the end of the day, it's the right result for the team and for the drivers' championship. But I don't think it was orchestrated."