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Hopefully they'll manage to show all 4 overtakes on TV

Former Jordan F1 engineer / designer Gary Anderson did a piece last year for The Race showing how they could relatively easily extend Monaco by about 1km. It would add a DRS zone and a hairpin. No major building works or infrastructure would be required other than possibly some resurfacing and then adding the usual F1 barriers, kerbs etc.

Qualifying is the spectacle, lighter, smaller cars is what F1 needs.

You can change the cars, but you can't change the streets.

You can change the circuit. Since the 50s, they completely reprofiled the chicane, the swimming pool section and the last three corners. Move the chicane further down the straight / Avenue de JFK so it’s just before Tabac. That would at least create one overtaking place. You can’t just remove it as there is literally no run off at tabac.

I love the Monaco race. I hope they keep it. It takes a lot of skill not to crash on the route - overtaking isn’t everything. And I love the history.

#1. Move the Nouvelle chicane down to roughly the current 1/2 way point between Tabac and its current location. Then have DRS available upon exiting the tunnel. #2. Create a platform over the ocean (like for the Nouvelle chicane, just larger) going from Piscine to Rascasse and allowing a straight shot from Louis Chiron into Rascasse (eliminating Piscine). This would allow drivers to carry more speed into Rascasse and make it more of a 90 degree turn, which could also be wider and provide a chance at an overtake, but more importantly closer following into that final corner before the front straight.

Pirelli should select C1, C3 e C5. So the gap between tires will be bigger 🙂

Also Monaco should have a purple ultra soft special tyre available just for that weekend

Monaco is increasingly becoming a one-off, trading more-and-more on it's history and glamour. It is also the one place where Ocon's suggestion of a spec car would be ideally-suited. Get rid of sprint races and in their place add some FIA-concieved (lol) spec car that every team would have to field. A predictable Sunday is unfortunately part of adhering to F1 history.

Well the current layout is definitely not the one from the 50s, apart from the chicane after the tunnel stuff the biggest difference is rerouting the track to the other side of the pool (and creating thus the pool section) and adding the whole Rascas "loop" - this was done in the early 70s, the original layout run just where the pits are these days, and it turned in one sharp 180 righthand hairpin onto the start/finish straight.

I love how Tommy was sitting on that China reference and was so happy when he got to pull it out You see a lot of other driving championships doing it where they have regular pitstops then a long one where there is a set minimum time they can be in the pit for.

If you’ve ever driven the track on a sim you’ll know how insane it would be to hold a race there. Qualifying is the race.

I'd like to see it become what the final stretch in Paris is in the Tour de France, where you have a full season and then a final "race" that's more just ceremonial.

The C3 is just too durable for the less abrasive tracks. Also even hard tyres need to fall apart after maximum 50% race distance, but need to stay or become more resistant to thermal wear.

F1 just released the full 2008 Monaco GP on youtube. It was a great watch. Actual overtaking. Smaller cars. So it’s kinda simple to fix the race, but how to make the cars smaller, not so simple.

Yeah they need to get rid of that awkward chicane after the tunnel. The cars seem barely just big enough to even get through

9:28 Completely agree, Matt. My biggest complaint about about our Australian Supercars Championship is that the race weekend format changes constantly. Sometimes it’s 3 sprint races, sometimes it’s 2 longer races, sometime we get a too 10 shootout (one shot quali), some times it’s knockout. If the race weekend format was consistent (keeping the endurance race formats the same though) then it’s the perfect racing series.

In recent history the quickest strategy on paper always was 2 stops, but you never could do that cause you would have to be able to overtake - so no tyres won't fix it. You could however widen the track if you would make use of the sidewalks with turning them into curbs and therefor widening the track. There are a lot of cars going side by side to the breaking point of the chicane, but they would always need another 50m or so. Therfor just move the chicane either 50m back or add the roundabout before the tunnel to the tracklayout. Those are 2-3 relatively easy fixes which don't alter the track to much but should greatly help with overtakes.

Two things: Jetpack and Grappling Hooks. Guaranteed to make anything way better than it was.

Annual reminder of Jules Bianchi's goated performance in 2014 🇫🇷

Heres an idea Ive had. If safety measures will always prevent the cars from getting significantly smaller, Monaco should become an All Star Weekend. Obviously more thought would be needed to be put into it, but Ive thought that maybe on friday they could do 1 on 1 drag races to see who gets the best starts / closest to the cone to see who can brake the latest, team relays on saturdays to see who has the best driver lineup and on sunday they could do single hot laps, with all of the events in equal machinery so that the weekend can really showcase who is the best of the best amongst the drivers.

Love you guys! Keep up the great work!

No matter what is done due to it being so narrow Monaco will never be a Silverstone. The appeal is the walls and at any moment a driver could crash. Take Mick last year for example. 10 or so millimeters off and the car is in 2! Honestly the way to make Monaco better is to just accept it as it is as it can never truly change. And if it does dramatically change will it still be Monaco?

Tommy: Nothing happened at the 2016 Chinese Grand Prix Me: Nothing but THE BIRTH OF THE TORPEDO!

Unfortunately most of those suggestions won't work. Like the tires for example. We see already that whenever Pirelli is going a step softer, the drivers just go slower and manage the pace to still get to one stop. That will only be stronger in Monaco where you can actually drive real slow and keep position. Making the cars smaller is a must, not just for Monaco, but with all the added safety features, we're never going back to the cars of 20 years ago. Opening up some corners and do little tweaks left and right might be possible but the impact will be minor. Opening up the entrance to the tunnel for example by as little as 20 cm, will make it easier to follow into the tunnel, same with the last corner and I think in both there is just a tree that's in the way. Major changes to the track are hard, since it's build in between the water and the hills, you can pretty much only extend it at the tunnel entrance and maybe at Rascas. But any extension will still be tight, it is in a city build up a hill next to the sea after all, there simply isn't much place in Monaco. I have to agree with Tommy, it's Monaco, we can have that one track a year where overtaking is difficult. And to be honest, I've always enjoyed watching Monaco, even without overtakes, it is a special one.

There is the option of a Monaco track extension. This has been looked at before. The idea being there is the original track plus an extension which must be used for a certain number of laps. How and when teams decide to use the longer lap would add to the strategy required and the extension would involve longer straights, DRS zone and the chance for overtaking.

I remember the chicane after the tunnel was different in the past, and there is where the overtakes happened a lot in Monaco. I would move it to give more straight with DRS enabled.

Bring back the Q2 tires. The tires that drivers in the top 10 used in Q2, have to be used at the start. This means that they will try to use the mediums in Q2 and if they don’t they have to start on the shitty soft tire. Because of this they have to maken 2 stops.

I was multitasking so didn’t understand “shaving off Damon Hill” and had to play the commercial back. Love you guys! That was hilarious and made me chuckle!

I think the thing about a softer tyre would be a good idea, and also messing with qualy a bit. Though I would also recommend like a heritage weekend like I've seen NASCAR do cause the whole 2021 McLaren livery was probably one of the biggest things from that race.

Totally agree about needing more 2 stop races across the whole calendar! This is a huge factor imo in creating more opportunities for the 'slower' car in any battles, up front and midfield.

Remove the chicane, allow drs to be opened immediately going through the tunnel

I haven't watched the monoco layout but I think if you take out the 10 &11 chicanes and make single straight from the tunnel to turn 12, it might bring a kind of long path to overtake

One suggestion I've seen elsewhere and thought was a good idea was to create a 2nd layout for a Joker Lap a la Rallycross. It keep the traditional layout intact except for the turn out and turn in for the Joker Lap layout, it creates a bigger opportunity for a mixed up field because different cars will take it at different times, and it adds an additional variable when figuring out strategy - When do you do the joker lap compared to how fresh your tires are and what tires do you do the joker lap on? Do you try to minimize the time loss by taking fresh softs and going for the joker in clean air? Do you wait for your tires to be dead and run the joker as your in lap to manufacture clean air on your out lap, maximizing the fresh tires on the main circuit? The real solution is smaller, less aero dependant cars, but smaller cars will only happen with refueling (which although I would welcome, would never happen due to legitimate safety reasons), and any regulation changes to make the cars less aero dependant or smaller is only temporary as teams find ways to claw performance back and may result in one team nailing the new regs and the rest being left out, as we've seen with the new ground effect cars and Red Bull and as we saw with the change to Hyrbids with Merc.

The Monaco gp weekend Oh God this is always death

I think they should go all out and make it an 8-hour endurance race. Allocate an extra engine, gearbox, etc and a lot more tires and have refueling. It would make it the biggest spectacle of the year.

Love this video every year

Seriously go back and watch that monza 2020 race . Was brilliant

That sponsor spot 😂😂😂

Simply let F1 rule the broadcast

The alternate layout you're talking about that goes left and takes a massive detour, the example track on assetto corsa makes that route look just as wide as the rest of the track, but if you look on Google maps, it's about 5m wide for the whole thing (with the exception of the roundabout), which is even narrower than the rest of the track (which I measured at a bit over 8m wide). However, I do think it would be OK to just take the other direction around the roundabout and for that to be the only extension, it's not much further but it gives a slightly longer run into and through the tunnel that may increase the overtaking opportunity into the Nouvelle chicane. The roundabout itself I believe is slightly wider than the rest of the track, but I don't think it would encourage overtaking since you can't really get the run into it, but you never know.

The idea I floated to my friend before was adding in a joker lap element like rallycross. Adding in an additional strategy element, keeping the historic layout for most laps, and help spread out the racers to promote overtake attempts since they have less to risk if the move does not work.

0:30 with smaller cars it can also help overtaking in other tracks such as Abu Dhabi, Hungary, Sochi

Actually, changing up the rules for Monaco wouldn't be too crazy an idea. I like the suggestion about bigger tire gaps a lot. And a different quali format might also be a good idea. Maybe not as a one-lap-shootout but maybe something similar to the Formula e quali, just for this one race. Because Monaco is already quite unique in the way that it is the only 260km race on the calendar and is also run on an outdated layout, which could still work, but not with the current standard regulations implemented.

Tommy always has the smartest points! I love him!!

There is a video recently where an extra length was put in to the circuit turn left before Portier, two long straights.

I feel this has kinda gone under the radar but bring back the rule that forces top 10 cars to start on the tyre they qualified on in Q2. Could really spice qualifying and race strategies back up again, seeing if the top cars can get through on the mediums.

Make it a post season time trial event (showing off the new cars) so we can keep the glitz, glamour and excitement of qualifying without having to waste a race weekend on a track that simply no longer works.

I think for tires to be a good solution to increase passing the tire has to be made to maintain their grip with almost no fall off for the majority of the life of the tire before having a sharp decline in performance. What makes strategies of doing an additional stop to take softer tires difficult is that when the tires are fresh the car may be 1.5 seconds faster per lap, but by the time the driver on the softer ties catches up with their competitor on harder tires and tries to pass, the softer tire is already worn too much and only has a 0.5 second per lap advantage. If the tire has a period where the grip does not fall off, then the pass will be possible up until the point when the soft tire hits the cliff.

All I’ll say is the race is the best to go to of the few that I have travelled to in recent times. It’s hard to beat seeing the entire spectacle and then after practice or qual a giant party breaking out on track. It’s a wonderful experience and second to none.

People so focused on overtaking maybe for this one race we can focus on race-craft yk, I know overtakes are entertaining but the pressure of keeping a driver behind and not overshooting your braking point nor compromising your race-line while also managing your tires can be interesting too

Have fun in Monaco you 2 very deserved 👍👍💜💜

Changing the tires and increasing importance of strategy brings more team contributions which is interesting for constructors champ

I think what Tom is trying to say is that what makes races exciting is a battle at the front for the championship, not just overtakes or even a given race win.

Remove the chicane after the tunnel to promote overtaking.

Bernie’s sprinklers still looking kind of promising

700kg spec car with a naturally aspirated 1.0 liter and KERS instead of a hybrid. A Monaco only car. Half points for the championship, but the race is still on the original track, and it is still on the championship calendar. Keep the halo, roll over structure, and carbon fiber construction. Have simplified front and rear aero, and paddle shift 6 speed gearbox, but otherwise the car is cigar shaped like the 1960s. Use 13" rims. To keep costs down have Perelli bring an extra soft tire compound and that or the inters is the only tire they can run. Mandate a tire change, but with only one compound it will just be the same tire unless there is changing conditions. For funzies, make the chassis and everything inside it spec, but the teams can develop their own wings and mirrors within a legality box. Teams have a 1,000,000 budget to develop and build the non spec parts, and driver's seats. With the lighter car and much less horsepower it should be much easier to develop crash structures, even in the less complex design. Make every F1 team participate in the development of next years Monaco car by sending a small engineering detachment toward the end of the year to hammer out a design and divide up which parts get made by which teams. Making every team send an engineer or two in November to collaborate will have the interesting effect of causing a cross pollination of ideas, even though the engineers are ostensibly working on a car with zero relation to the real cars they work on the rest of the year. Also, the teams are going to send mostly young engineers, which will give those guys more experience taking the lead in projects since they are away from their usual management, and somebody has to take charge.

All they need to do is make the tunnel straight maybe longer and make the chicane wider like Monza T1-2 to promote more overtakes into that section while making it less like just hoping the curb to keep the position

Just create giant run off areas and paint them with blue and red stripes. I can't imagine how that could go wrong.

I feel like this video is uploaded every year haha

What a dream, hope you enjoy your stay at Monaco!!💜

Problem is with the 3 tyre situation, you may end up with them running the 1st 2 tyres for as long as they can only for them to dip in at the final lap or so to use the 3rd...or worse, running only 2 laps and ducking in at the start of the race and running the remaining two for the rest of the race as per a pretty normal race. It'ld have to be brought in with those sorts of situations in mind.

Use modular track sections on floating barges. Extend the circuit with these, like a full-size Scaletrix kit, to suit. Would be unique and very cool!

Make the cars smaller than US pickup trucks again. That would be a good start.

Congrats boys have fun on location!

One way to improve overtaking is to move the nouvelle chicane a bit further towards tabac. This was the case in an older layout in 1972. How many times have we seen drivers running out of road when coming out of tunnel. Giving them an extra 100 to 200 metres will help.

Remove the chicane after the the tunnel. It can't hurt.

Qualifying is amazing. Even free practice has an element of jeopardy that makes it worth watching. Don’t touch the track.

Make turn 1 wider to the right because in the breaking zone the left hand side barrier comes in on the track, and the big one make the chicane after the tunnel smaller so a car can dive on the inside

Ok so I have an idea why not make the tunnel section longer ie make them go straight on the double chicane and make the left hander more sharp to promote divebombing… sounds dangerous but exiting

I think they should get rid of the Nouvelle chicane after the tunnel and put a tecpro at Tabac. As far as preserving history is concerned, the chicane has only been there like that since 86. Would give us a 900 metre DRS straight, which is almost as long as Bahrain's.

Make the cars smaller 😂

The tyres makes sense. Everything about Formula racing is, "Here is the formula. Try win with it." Compounds are already softer or harder for different tracks when looking at C0-C5 and picking what will be S, M, H for that race. With this idea, overtaking can be achieved with emphasis on strategy, not necessarily just drivers/cars, and that's all part of what makes good racing. Formula racing is, after all, constructor vs constructor, team vs team, and lastly driver vs driver.

3 mandatory compounds and set a minimum laps for every compound ex. 10laps for hard 5 for med 3 for soft. so teams just dont do 1 lap on the least preferred compound. And use this model and other tracks also, maybe all. It will give a lot of different strategies.

How to save Monaco GP: Step 1 -> Get Tommy to change his mind about Monaco being a good race Step 2 -> Get rid of Monaco, bin it out of the calendar Step 3 -> Profit

Monaco is in the top 3 of best watched GPs every year, so i dont see the problem.

I subbed to P1 for Matt's commentary, but with this format I'm really enjoying Tommy's insight and F1 encyclopædia knowledge depth.

2:51 there is even an alternative Route where they could have a wider section. when you go down the hill at Mirabeau you turn left and then comes a section like Bakus 2nd sector. you would turn right a few 100 meters before the tunnel and continue the lap as it is. this would actually just change 4 corners but the lap would be longer and have a wide sector 2 to have the odd overtake. ...even though I Love Monaco, the only fix is making it wider and thats not gonna happen even impossible at some places.

Enjoying Tommy's shirt. Classic. The last corner can open up and maybe advance the chicane a bit. Not easy. Cars too big though, still too reliant on aero

The first 30" of this video shows why Matt & Tommy are the perfect pair. One Glass half full, the other glass half empty.

Go left before the tunnel and through the round about to lengthen the run to the chicane just this little bit, redo the last turn for a better exit and maybe widen the chicane (just make the promenade there a meter wider in the sea), do a indy-500-style qualifying (solo-attempts, you can go again but loose your previous time) and/or make two stops mandatory.

One thing about Monaco, the lack of spaces does make for surprise outcomes sometimes. It's the one place where having a car better than everyone else's doesn't really mean that much. Especially if it rains. Oh and as for a way to improve it, do a sprint race, top 10 start the race in reverse order.

100% agree with Tommy regarding the track staying to same so we have a direct comparison over 70 years of cars

2016 China, Kvyat and Vettel came together in the first turn where he "came in like a torpedo"

I like the old chain bear video where he suggested a "joker lap"

How about a joker lap using that unused roundabout just before they go into the tunnel. It would be crazy…. Or just add it and DRS on what might be a long enough stretch for an overtake.

Oooh, add a floating section of track in the harbour!

What if the tyres you started on depended on which session you qualified in with compounds getting softer the further back you go to encourage backmarkers to push from the start I.e get knocked out in Q1 start on softs, Q2 mediums and Q3 hards

I've always wondered if it would be possible to remove the chicane at the bottom of the hill out of the tunnel. It's an artificial chicane anyway, so that's a fairly easy way to double the length of the straight and possibly give the cars a bit more chance to overtake. I'm assuming the reason is safety but with modern barriers I think we can mitigate that risk pretty well

2016 Canada was the origin of the torpedo. Very important race

Smaller cars would be great but also making the track a bit wider and fix the dips i know they removed the small dip around turn 1 along time ago, smooth out the dip before the hairpin i think its after turn 3. Widen the turns after the tunnel and maybe remove or reduce the corner before rascasse

I just have to say that was the best Manscaped ad I’ve ever seen.

We need some rain in qualifying to mix up the grid to get an interesting race. Or some rain during the race, not enough for full wets, but something between slick and intermediate, so we can see mixed strategies, that would be spicy...

I'm all-in for making a 1-lap qualy, or at least keeping the Q1-Q2-Q3 but with only one for shot for each driver

What if they raced the opposite way around the track like last corner is the first corner and the first corner and the last answer?

It's not broken first of all. It has been this way since forever. It's something different. It's for the challenge of race at high speeds in a much smaller and compact place and any mistakes and you basically is done. Even when we have smaller cars it was the same thing. It's how it is. The problem is that you have other circuits with a lot more space and no overtakes. THAT is a problem. But smaller cars, refueling and tyres with more fall off would bring more variables to all of the races. That chicane at the end of the tunnel is very annoying. I understand that is for safety, otherwise the car would get by the end of the straight at 320 km/h and if one go over the other the car goes flying on the grandstands, pit roads and end up on the finish line but still... it's annoying. The truth is: this regulations still not good. Let's hope that 2026 brings something better

Either 3 compounds with each compound being mandatory to use during a race, or you only bring 2 compounds and has a new disparity in the hardest of the tire (C1 and C5 only, for instance)

My suggestion would be: Scratch the chicane after the tunnel and just make the road a bit wider (the space is obviously there. Cars get close there but they just need a bit more time. Plus tweak the last corner a bit. So you can maybe get a super fast section down the harbor to get close and then make a move around the last two corners.