Lewis Hamilton was the winner of the 2008 Monaco Grand Prix, a really chaotic race where many things happened, risks were taken, mistakes were made.
The race started under rain, and the majority of the pilots had chosen the rain tyres to use. It seemed like a thrilling start as it was the first time after a very long time that the drivers had to race with no electronic aid in the slippery wet Monaco track.
The start went OK with no accidents. Hamilton had an excellent start and got in front of Kimi Raikkonen for P2. The race seemed to had taken its natural pace when things started to change. Many pilots switched tyres from "wet" to "extreme conditions". After some time the rain stopped but the forecast was expecting race to start again soon. That was the time when strategies started changing. Some pilots were using wet tyres, some were using "extreme conditions" tyres, with the second being faster at the time.
But when the rain stopped some pilots took the risk and switched to normal tyres, disregarding the weather forecast predictions about the rain starting again. This, as proven finally, has been the best choice, and all pilots who made it early had gained an advantage.
Massa lost the first place to Kubica after a mistake he made in the first turn, But both of them lost their places to Lewis Hamilton some laps later. Kimi Raikkonen faced a number of problems with his car and couldn't do much. He was fifth behind an excellent A. Sutil who has been holding fourth place for Force India at that time. This was going to be a great result for the Indian team but, unfortunately, Sutil's race ended when Kimi lost the rear of his car during the braking for the chicane and crashed on Sutil's Force India.
Raikkonen managed to continue the race but only finish 9th.
The race finished two laps earlier (76 instead of 78), as the maximum duration of 2 hours had been reached.
The results are as follows :
01 L. Hamilton McLaren 2:00:42.742
02 R. Kubica BMW + 3.064
03 F. Massa Ferrari + 4.811
04 M. Webber Red Bull + 19.295
05 S. Vettel Toro Rosso + 24.657
06 R. Barrichello Honda + 28.408
07 K. Nakajima Williams + 30.180
08 H. Kovalainen McLaren + 33.191
09 K. Räikkönen Ferrari + 33.792
10 F. Alonso Renault + 1 laps
11 J. Button Honda + 1 laps
12 T. Glock Toyota + 1 laps
13 J. Trulli Toyota + 1 laps
14 N. Heidfeld BMW + 4 laps
Did not finish
15 A. Sutil Force India F1 + 7 laps
16 N. Rosberg Williams + 17 laps
17 N. Piquet jr. Renault + 31 laps
18 G. Fisichella Force India F1 + 40 laps
19 D. Coulthard Red Bull + 70 laps
20 S. Bourdais Scuderia Toro Rosso + 70 laps
