Monaco GP 2026: Antonelli makes it five in a row after red flag

Andrea Kimi Antonelli won the Monaco Grand Prix from pole position, beating Lewis Hamilton by 6.271 seconds on the streets of Monte Carlo after 78 laps that included two safety cars, a red flag and a standing restart. It was the Mercedes driver's fifth consecutive victory. Isack Hadjar finished third, his first podium for Red Bull.

How Antonelli won in Monaco

Antonelli got away cleanly while Hamilton and Charles Leclerc went past Max Verstappen, whose afternoon was over almost at once: the Red Bull lost power at the start and never completed a lap. When Hamilton pitted for hard tyres on lap 29, the leader was more than 12 seconds clear, and the gap grew to almost 30 seconds before anything went wrong.

It went wrong at the final corner. Lance Stroll hit the barrier there to bring out the first safety car, and Leclerc crashed at the same spot as the field prepared to restart; he blamed his brakes. With the asphalt breaking up, the race was stopped for around 40 minutes. Antonelli lost his cushion but not the lead, held Hamilton off into Sainte Devote at the standing restart and was six seconds clear at the flag.

Lando Norris parked his McLaren with no power, his second technical retirement in a row, while Oscar Piastri came home fourth. The stewards were busy. Pierre Gasly crossed the line third, but two five-second penalties for pit-lane speeding dropped him to seventh and handed Hadjar the podium. Sergio Pérez, tenth on the road, lost Cadillac's first point to a penalty for being out of position on the grid at the restart, which promoted Fernando Alonso and gave Aston Martin their first points of 2026.

Teammate duels in Monaco

Mercedes. The gap inside the team was wide all weekend. Antonelli out-qualified George Russell by more than half a percent of a lap, then won while Russell finished 12th. Russell had been running third after Leclerc's crash, but an early pit-lane speeding penalty was not served properly at his stop, and the drive-through that followed dropped him out of the points. On F1 Duels, their head-to-head now reads 4–2 to Antonelli in qualifying and 4–1 in races.

Ferrari. Hamilton beat Leclerc in qualifying by a tenth of a percent, third against fourth on the grid. The race gives no verdict in our count, which logs Leclerc's exit as a mechanical failure, consistent with the brakes he described. Their 2026 duel is level at 3–3 in qualifying, Hamilton leads 3–2 in races, and he is now second in the championship.

Red Bull. Verstappen won the qualifying duel, second on the grid to Hadjar's fifth, and that was his day done. Hadjar did the rest: he kept Russell behind through a long first stint despite an engine-braking problem, then inherited third from Gasly's penalties. Verstappen's failure keeps the race out of their F1 Duels count, which stays 4–2 to Verstappen on Saturdays and 2–0 on Sundays.

Racing Bulls. Liam Lawson survived a technical problem as the car was fired up, started tenth and finished fifth. Arvid Lindblad came from 15th to sixth, his best Formula 1 result, and was still a place behind. Lawson keeps the edge at 4–2 in qualifying and 3–1 in races.

What it means for the title

Antonelli leaves Monaco on 156 points, 66 clear of Hamilton, who moved past Russell into second. Russell is third, 68 behind his teammate, after six of 22 rounds. The driver with the same car is now further from the lead than a Ferrari.