Vettel credits 'great decisions on the pit wall' for big Monaco F1 points haul

Vettel was running in seventh before the pit stop window, a couple of seconds behind Gasly and Hamilton.

Mercedes triggered the first round of stops with Hamilton on Lap 29, while Gasly followed suit a lap later.

Aston Martin responded with Vettel a couple of laps later and the German’s impressive pace on his worn soft tyres allowed him to jump the pair, moving up to a net fifth place - as he was overcut by Red Bull’s Sergio Perez. 

Reflecting on his first points since making the move to Aston Martin, Vettel told Sky Sports F1: “Well good. I think it’s a great result for us today. We can be very happy having two cars in the points. Great decisions today on the pit wall and good pace in the car when it mattered so I think that made the difference for us today.”

When exiting the pits, Vettel ran side-by-side with Gasly as the pair battled for position.

After the race, the AlphaTauri driver said he thought ‘we would end up in the harbour’.

Giving his recount of the battle with Gasly, Vettel explained: “I knew that around that time it would be crucial to make our race and Chris, my engineer, also told me ‘head down, now is the time’.

“The tyres weren’t fresh anymore but I was still able to go faster than I had up until that point and go a bit faster on the next lap and that made the difference. At the pit stop, it was just good enough.

“We had a bit of a wait but it was very, very tight with Pierre coming out. And up the hill, I didn’t see him initially, like I saw he was there but I didn’t know exactly where and it was a drag race up the hill and it’s not straight up the hill and I gave him room but eventually he had to back out of it.”