As always, the Grand Prix of Monaco provided a fairly spectacular showing, likely one of the few in this year’s F1 series. As most would expect, Circuit de Monaco lap-time record holder and five-time winner, Michael Schumacher took the pole position, but officials forced him back five grid positions after he caused a collision during qualifying. With the technical nature of Monaco, that pole position is very important and Schumacher’s penalty was an ominous sign that this would not be a good race, as he retired due to fuel issues 63 laps in.

Schumacher’s penalty propelled Red Bull’s Mark Webber into the pole position. Webber held onto that pole position, despite a lead change during a pit stop, and took home the checkered flag on a rain-coated Circuit de Monaco. As we said in our preview of the 2012 Grand Prix of Monaco, this race had some serious overall points influence, as the leaders were only separated by a few points each.

This victory for Webber places propels him up to a second place tie with Sebastian Vettel at 73 points and puts Fernando Alonso, who finished third, in the points lead at 76. An impressive run by Nico Rosberg placed him in second, just behind Webber, proving that his wide margin of victory in China was not just a one-time deal. This superb finish by Rosberg jumps him up two slots to fifth place overall.

From the looks of it, this season is shaping up to be a rather close points race with a few new faces near the top. Unfortunately, the leader board, for the most part, looks identical to the 2011 and 2010 seasons. The lack of parody in F1 has really been its Achilles heel in recent history. An overall points victory by Nico Rosberg would certainly be a push in the right direction for F1, so we’ll keep a close eye on his performance.

Click past the jump to see the complete placement board for the 2012 Grand Prix of Monaco and the overall points standings.

2012 Grand Prix of Monaco Results:

Pos

No

Driver

Team

Laps

Time/Retired

Grid

Pts

1

2

Mark Webber

Red Bull Racing-Renault

78

1:46:06.557

1

25

2

8

Nico Rosberg

Mercedes

78

+0.6 secs

2

18

3

5

Fernando Alonso

Ferrari

78

+0.9 secs

5

15

4

1

Sebastian Vettel

Red Bull Racing-Renault

78

+1.3 secs

9

12

5

4

Lewis Hamilton

McLaren-Mercedes

78

+4.1 secs

3

10

6

6

Felipe Massa

Ferrari

78

+6.1 secs

7

8

7

11

Paul di Resta

Force India-Mercedes

78

+41.5 secs

14

6

8

12

Nico Hulkenberg

Force India-Mercedes

78

+42.5 secs

10

4

9

9

Kimi Räikkönen

Lotus-Renault

78

+44.0 secs

8

2

10

19

Bruno Senna

Williams-Renault

78

+44.5 secs

13

1

11

15

Sergio Perez

Sauber-Ferrari

77

+1 Lap

23

0

12

17

Jean-Eric Vergne

STR-Ferrari

77

+1 Lap

16

0

13

20

Heikki Kovalainen

Caterham-Renault

77

+1 Lap

17

0

14

24

Timo Glock

Marussia-Cosworth

77

+1 Lap

19

0

15

23

Narain Karthikeyan

HRT-Cosworth

76

+2 Laps

22

0

16

3

Jenson Button

McLaren-Mercedes

70

accident damage

12

0

Ret

16

Daniel Ricciardo

STR-Ferrari

65

Steering damage

15

0

Ret

25

Charles Pic

Marussia-Cosworth

64

Electrical

21

0

Ret

7

Michael Schumacher

Mercedes

63

Fuel pressure

6

0

Ret

21

Vitaly Petrov

Caterham-Renault

15

Electrical

18

0

Ret

14

Kamui Kobayashi

Sauber-Ferrari

5

Accident damage

11

0

Ret

22

Pedro de la Rosa

HRT-Cosworth

0

Accident damage

20

0

Ret

18

Pastor Maldonado

Williams-Renault

0

Accident

24

0

Ret

10

Romain Grosjean

Lotus-Renault

0

Accident

4

0


Overall Points 2012:

Pos

Driver

Pos

Team

Driver

1

Fernando Alonso

Spanish

Ferrari

76

+1

2

Sebastian Vettel

German

Red Bull Racing-Renault

73

-1

3

Mark Webber

Australian

Red Bull Racing-Renault

73

+2

4

Lewis Hamilton

British

McLaren-Mercedes

63

-1

5

Nico Rosberg

German

Mercedes

59

+2

6

Kimi Räikkönen

Finnish

Lotus-Renault

51

-2

7

Jenson Button

British

McLaren-Mercedes

45

-2

8

Romain Grosjean

French

Lotus-Renault

35

0

9

Pastor Maldonado

Venezuelan

Williams-Renault

29

0

10

Sergio Perez

Mexican

Sauber-Ferrari

22

0

11

Paul di Resta

British

Force India-Mercedes

21

+1

12

Kamui Kobayashi

Japanese

Sauber-Ferrari

19

-1

13

Bruno Senna

Brazilian

Williams-Renault

15

0

14

Felipe Massa

Brazilian

Ferrari

10

+3

15

Nico Hulkenberg

German

Force India-Mercedes

7

0

16

Jean-Eric Vergne

French

STR-Ferrari

4

-3

17

Daniel Ricciardo

Australian

STR-Ferrari

2

-1

18

Michael Schumacher

German

Mercedes

2

0

19

Heikki Kovalainen

Finnish

Caterham-Renault

0

+3

20

Timo Glock

German

Marussia-Cosworth

0

-1

21

Charles Pic

French

Marussia-Cosworth

0

-1

22

Narain Karthikeyan

Indian

HRT-Cosworth

0

+2

23

Vitaly Petrov

Russian

Caterham-Renault

0

-2

24

Pedro de la Rosa

Spanish

HRT-Cosworth

0

-1


Biggest position increases:

Felipe Massa

Felipe finished sixth overall, rebounding from his 15th place finish in Spain. This netted him a much needed eight points and helped him go from 17th overall the 14th overall in the F1 standings.

Heikki Kovalainen

Heikki’s 13th place finish in Monaco did not earn him any points, but it did give him a placement advantage over the remaining 0-point drivers this year. This helped him jump three places from 22nd to 19th place in the overall 2012 standings.

Biggest position decreases:

Jean-Eric Vergne

Jean-Eric tumbled a total of three positions in the 2012 overall standings, going from 13th place to 16th place. This tumble comes following back-to-back 12th place finishes in Spain and Monaco.