The 1970 Monaco Grand Prix was a Formula One motor race held at the Circuit de Monaco on 10 May 1970. It was race 3 of 13 in both the 1970 World Championship of Drivers and the 1970 International Cup for Formula One Manufacturers. Jochen Rindt scored the last victory for the famous Lotus 49.
This was Bruce McLaren's final Formula One race - as he was killed 5 days before the next race at Belgium - and Ronnie Peterson's first.
Report There were no significant changes in the drivers' lineup for Monaco, and the only new driver was Ronnie Peterson, entering in a non-works March. The Lotus team decided to bring the old 49C chassis instead of the new 72, despite testing the new car in a non-championship race at Silverstone a couple of weeks earlier. In qualifying March swept the front row, with Jackie Stewart on pole (for the Tyrrell team) and Chris Amon alongside him. Third was Denny Hulme's McLaren, and fourth the Brabham of Jack Brabham; behind them was the Ferrari of Jacky Ickx. The first Lotus driver was Jochen Rindt, qualifying in eighth place.
Despite heavy rain during the practice laps, the drivers raced in clear conditions and on a dry track. Stewart led the field with Amon, Brabham, Ickx and Jean-Pierre Beltoise behind him; Hulme got a poor start and was way down the order after the first corner. On the second lap, Beltoise passed Ickx, who retired on lap 12 with a driveshaft failure. On lap 22 Beltoise, now in fourth, retired with transmission problems; on the same lap Brabham passed Amon to take second place. Stewart remained the race leader until his car began misfiring on lap 27. After a long pit stop, Stewart returned to the race only to eventually retire. This left Brabham in the lead, with Amon, Hulme and Rindt following. The engine failed on Jackie Oliver's BRM, who retired due to quickly falling oil pressure. At around the same time, Hulme developed problems with the gearing of his McLaren and so dropped back behind Rindt and Henri Pescarolo.
On lap 62 Amon's suspension failed; he was forced to retire, leaving Rindt in second place nine seconds behind Brabham. Rindt increased his pace, able to close the gap to Brabham. On the final corner of the last lap, however, Brabham defended the inside line to prevent Rindt from passing. There was less traction on the dusty surface off the racing line, and Brabham locked the wheels under braking and the car skidded across the track towards the barriers. Rindt passed behind him and won the race. Brabham quickly reversed and finished the race in second position. Third was Pescarolo in a Matra, while the remaining points positions were rounded out by Hulme, Graham Hill (who worked his way up from the last spot on the grid) and Pedro Rodríguez.
Qualifying
Qualifying classification Pos.DriverConstructorTimeGrid1 Jackie StewartMarch-Ford1:24.012 Chris AmonMarch-Ford1:24.623 Denny HulmeMcLaren-Ford1:25.134 Jack BrabhamBrabham-Ford1:25.445 Jacky IckxFerrari1:25.556 Jean-Pierre BeltoiseMatra1:25.667 Henri PescaroloMatra1:25.778 Jochen RindtLotus-Ford1:25.989 Piers CourageDe Tomaso-Ford1:26.1910 Bruce McLarenMcLaren-Ford1:26.11011 Jo SiffertMarch-Ford1:26.211 Rolf StommelenBrabham-Ford1:26.3— Andrea de AdamichMcLaren-Alfa Romeo1:26.3—14 Graham HillLotus-Ford1:26.81615 Ronnie PetersonMarch-Ford1:26.812 George EatonBRM1:27.0—17 John SurteesMcLaren-Ford1:27.413 John MilesLotus-Ford1:27.4—19 Jackie OliverBRM1:27.514 Johnny Servoz-GavinMarch-Ford1:28.1—21 Pedro RodríguezBRM1:28.815
Race
Classification Pos No Driver Constructor Laps Time/Retired Grid Points 1 3 Jochen Rindt Lotus-Ford 80 1:54:37.4 8 9 2 5 Jack Brabham Brabham-Ford 80 + 23.1 4 6 3 9 Henri Pescarolo Matra 80 + 51.4 7 4 4 11 Denny Hulme McLaren-Ford 80 + 1:28.3 3 3 5 1 Graham Hill Lotus-Ford 79 + 1 Lap 16 2 6 17 Pedro Rodríguez BRM 78 + 2 Laps 15 1 7 23 Ronnie Peterson March-Ford 78 + 2 Laps 12 8 19 Jo Siffert March-Ford 76 Out of Fuel 11 28 Chris Amon March-Ford 60 Suspension 2 24 Piers Courage De Tomaso-Ford 58 + 22 Laps 9 21 Jackie Stewart March-Ford 57 Engine 1 16 Jackie Oliver BRM 42 Engine 14 8 Jean-Pierre Beltoise Matra 21 Differential 6 12 Bruce McLaren McLaren-Ford 19 Suspension 10 14 John Surtees McLaren-Ford 14 Oil Pressure 13 26 Jacky Ickx Ferrari 11 Halfshaft 5 10 Andrea de Adamich McLaren-Alfa Romeo 6 Rolf Stommelen Brabham-Ford 15 George Eaton BRM 2 John Miles Lotus-Ford 20 Johnny Servoz-Gavin March-Ford
Notes
This was the Formula One World Championship debut for Swedish driver and future Grand Prix winner Ronnie Peterson. This was the 5th win of a Monaco Grand Prix by Lotus. It broke the old record set by BRM at the 1966 Monaco Grand Prix.
Championship standings after the race
Drivers' Championship standings Pos Driver Points 1 1 Jack Brabham 15 1 2 Jackie Stewart 13 13 3 Jochen Rindt 9 1 4 Denny Hulme 9 1 5 Bruce McLaren 6Source:
Constructors' Championship standings Pos Constructor Points 2 1 Brabham-Ford 15 2 McLaren-Ford 15 1 3 Lotus-Ford 14 3 4 March-Ford 13 5 Matra 7Source:
References
Further reading