1967 Monaco Grand Prix
Denny Hulme took his first career win, though it was sadly overshadowed by the death of Ferrari’s Lorenzo Bandini. Bandini had been running second and chasing Hulme down for the victory in the closing stages when he crashed at the chicane. It took the marshals an age to put out the resulting fire (even by the standards of the day) and Bandini died in hospital a few days later. Graham Hill finished second and Chris Amon third.
1978 Monaco Grand Prix
After seven third places and eight second places, Patrick Depailler finally won his first grand prix. John Watson led the early stages until he dropped back following a mistake, while Niki Lauda’s chances were spoiled by a mid-race puncture – though he did manage to recover to second, ahead of Jody Scheckter in the Wolf.
1989 Monaco Grand Prix
Despite losing first and second gears, Ayrton Senna took a comfortable win as teammate Alain Prost found himself losing time to other people’s incidents. First, he was held up by a collision at the Loews Hairpin between Andrea de Cesaris and Nelson Piquet (who sat in their cars shouting at each other for a bit as they blocked the track) and then by the Ligier of René Arnoux, who he was trying to lap at the time. Arnoux – frequently a tough backmarker – wasn’t having the best of seasons and during commentary, Murray Walker explained that Arnoux felt he was struggling to get on terms with naturally aspirated F1 cars, having driven with turbo power for virtually his whole career. In the process, he set co-commentator James Hunt up for one of his most iconic commentary lines:
“And all I can say to that is bullshit.”
So, anyway…
Behind the McLaren duo, it had been a good day for some of the smaller teams. Despite having to come through the pre-qualifying session, Brabham looked like the second fastest team for much of the weekend. Martin Brundle qualified fourth and was on course for a podium until a problem dropped him back to sixth, leaving Stefano Modena to finish third – his first podium, and the last for the Brabham team. Alex Caffi had also come through pre-qualifying for the Scuderia Italia team and he finished a career-best fourth.
2000 Spanish Grand Prix
Mika Hakkinen won his third Spanish GP in a row ahead of David Coulthard, who impressively finished second less than a week after being injured in a plane crash in which both pilots had died. Michael Schumacher had led the early phase of the race but slipped back with a slow puncture, in the process executing a superb defensive move on Ralf Schumacher which allowed teammate Rubens Barrichello to sneak past and grab the final place on the podium.
2006 European Grand Prix
Michael Schumacher won ahead of Fernando Alonso in quite a close, strategy-based race, with Felipe Massa edging out Kimi Raikkonen to take the first podium of his career.
