LiveScore’s Jim Munro gets you up to speed with the big talking points around the Formula 1 paddock ahead of the 2021 Monaco Grand Prix.

1. Does pole position guarantee you the win at Monaco? 

As pulsating as the racing can be round the iconic street circuit of the Principality, the thrills and spills tend to come from drivers bashing a wall, driving over the Nouvelle Chicane or simply landing on top of each other in desperate attempts to perform a successful overtake. 

You can’t escape the fact that a driver starting the Monaco Grand Prix in pole position has won 12 of the last 19 races and that since it was first competed in 1950, only 10 of the F1 races have been won by a driver starting lower than third.

It’s a welcome return to this historic venue after Covid restrictions saw last year’s grand prix taken off the calendar and Lewis Hamilton’s win in 2019 was the third time in the last six outings that the pole sitter has gone on to taste victory at Monaco.

The only real chance of us seeing a winner from outside of the top three is if rain decides to intervene, as it has done spectacularly in the past. 

In 1996, Frenchman Olivier Panis won from 14th place on the starting grid in atrocious weather which caused so much mayhem that just three cars crossed the finish line. It remains the lowest starting position for a Monaco F1 winner. 

2. Is this the ideal circuit for Red Bull to dominate Mercedes?

After the Spanish Grand Prix a fortnight ago, team boss Christian Horner was upbeat about Red Bull’s chances of tackling championship leaders Mercedes in Monaco. He was encouraged by how the cars performed through sector three at Catalunya with its slow corners that emulate Monaco’s tight twists and turns.  

Max Verstappen — sat 14 points behind Hamilton in the drivers’ championship — was less optimistic after Thursday’s practice runs in which Ferrari blew everybody away, with both Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz setting the best times in the second session. 

“We are too slow and not just by a little bit; I think quite a bit,” Verstappen said.

“We really need to find some pace. Everyone has traffic, so you need to look at optimum lap times or optimum sectors and we are quite off. 

“It also didn’t feel great to drive. Normally I’m quite comfortable in the car, quite easily get to a pace but it all takes too long, it's just not how I like it.

“I’m just surprised at how competitive Ferrari is. But I think it just shows that we are pretty weak,” he added. “They are doing very well and we are very weak, so the offset is very big.”

What Verstappen failed to mention is that those practice times can be heavily influenced by cars carrying different fuel loads and using tyres bearing varying amounts of wear and tear.  

His downplaying of his Red Bull’s handling wasn’t echoed by team-mate Sergio Perez. 

“It was great. I’m just enjoying it a lot, you know,” said the popular Mexican. 

“It’s a fantastic track. We had a verry good FP1. The car was feeling good. We did a couple of changes that we probably took a step back. 

“We have enough information for qualifying come Saturday but we need to find some pace at low fuel.”  

3. Can Charles Leclerc finally deliver in his home race?

Charles Leclerc is only the fifth driver in F1 history to have competed with a Monegasque license but in both his previous attempts at Monaco glory, he’s not only failed to make Q3, he’s yet to finish a race. 

Finding himself top of the time charts after yesterday’s second free practice session, he said: “I was quite surprised that it ended that way because here especially it’s important to do as many laps as you can. With the issues we had in FP1, I had only done four laps.

“But I felt quite at ease with the car in FP2 and managed to put that lap in.” 

He was also wary of the apparent sluggishness demonstrated by both Red Bull and Mercedes and wasn’t prepared to make any bold predictions.

“There’s still a bit of margin,” he said, “but on the other hand, I’m sure that Mercedes and Red Bull have more margin than we have. So we shouldn’t get carried away too much. 

“I want to wait until Saturday. For now, it’s looking good, but a bit too good to believe it, so let’s wait and see. 

“Saturday, we will know exactly where we are in qualifying, and then we will go from there for the race.”

4. Can Yuki Tsunoda bounce back after a horrible weekend in Spain?

Yuki Tsunoda impressed F1 fans in Bahrain’s season opener as he showed good pace in qualifying and scored points in his first ever F1 race. 

Things have got progressively worse for the AlphaTauri rookie though, earning a 12th and 15th place outside of the points in his next two outings, before failing to finish in Catalunya due to an electrical issue. 

His debut F1 appearance at Monaco provided an unwelcome surprise: Tsunoda’s second free practice session was cut short after he launched his AlphaTauri into the barriers at the exit of the Swimming Pool.

“I didn’t push too much hard in entry, I think I just lost the grip in the end,” he said, playing down the incident. 

“A lot of degradation there I think and a couple of gusts of wind. I lost completely the rear between turns 15 and 16 and I just had to finish the session. 

“I had two sets of soft tyres for Saturday so I think it’s not the worst-case or the end of the world. Just, I have to prepare more for Saturday and try to put it all together.” 

In Formula 2 last season, Tsunoda came alive as the season progressed, eventually finishing third in the championship, so we can expect more from him as the season progresses.

5. Is Daniel Ricciardo settling in at McLaren?

Eyebrows were raised at Imola when Ricciardo let teammate Lando Norris past under radio orders and his 21-year-old team-mate went on to finish on the podium with a 27.5 second advantage over the F1 veteran. But he has certainly improved since and Monaco is his domain. 

Ricciardo has won more points around the Principality’s intense circuit than he has at any other F1 venue and in 2018 pulled off a remarkable win for Red Bull after driving for 50 laps with only six of his eight gears operating properly.  

Although he began Thursday’s practice sessions with a smile, it wasn’t long before he was swearing at Charles Leclerc’s Ferrari and flipping the bird to Sebastian Vettel in his Aston Martin.

“I felt that I had confidence, it was just not translating to lap time,” said Ricciardo.

“Honestly, from behind the wheel it was quite frustrating because I would cross the line and be like, ‘Yeah, that was probably a decent lap’ and they were like, you’re P12 or P15 or even at one stage P17. 

“So it’s frustrating because it is a long way off. There is a lot of time to find. 

“Luckily we have [Friday] off, but right now it is like trying to figure out where all the time is.”

The answers may lie across the McLaren garage, where Norris was satisfied with his first run out.

“Today has been a good day,” he said. “I was comfortable from the beginning, which is very important around here. At the same time the car has been pretty fast. Pretty competitive.

“The people who are ahead of us we knew would be ahead of us. But comparing to the rest we seem pretty good. 

“I am comfortable in the car and the car is good. I have some things I want to improve for tomorrow. But all in all it was a good day, better than I expected.”

6. Is this the perfect stage for a Fernando Alonso revival?

What better place could there be for Fernando Alonso to remind everybody that he’s a two-time world champion? 

Monaco is renowned for bringing the best out of the elite drivers who rely less on the power of a car’s performance and more on its handling around the challenging street circuit. 

Alonso enjoyed back-to-back wins in the Principality in 2006 and 2007 and marked his return on Thursday with a ‘kiss’ — after his Alpine’s front wing tickled the barriers at the final corner during the first practice session.

It was certainly far less destructive than his smash at Massanet during practice 11 years ago. 

“I touched [the barriers] in 2010 and that was much more painful because I missed qualifying after that. So today was just a little kiss,” he said. 

“We did manage to complete a lot of laps, I think it was 37 in the morning and 27 in the afternoon: so 60-something laps today, which helps to keep the rhythm into the weekend.

“It was intense. Intense and I’m still not finished yet, you know? Because there is some work to do. Not only with the engineers but here in Monaco it’s quite special, not only because the track activity but because of the off-track [activity].

“It was a good day. I had fun out there driving on the streets here and yes, I think we still need to find more pace, more confidence in the car.

“But it was quite useful to get different set-up changes, different directions and I think now we need to put all together and improve the performance for Saturday.”

Since returning to the F1 stage with the newly-branded Alpine team, Alonso’s reappearance has been overshadowed by the form of teammate Esteban Ocon. 

Alonso has been outqualified 3-1 by Ocon so far and is yet to finish ahead of the Frenchman after the first four races of the season. 

While a podium would be too much to expect, a driver of Alonso’s calibre should fancy his chances on improving on the eight place he achieved in Portugal, his best result of 2021 so far.