Norris wins in Monaco to narrow gap to Piastri

McLaren's Lando Norris won the Monaco Grand Prix for the first time with a copybook drive, controlling the race from start to finish.

Norris navigated the potential pit falls of a new rule requiring drivers to use three sets of tyres during the race to lead throughout and beat Ferrari's Charles Leclerc for the Briton's second victory of the season.

McLaren's Oscar Piastri took third, well clear of Red Bull's Max Verstappen, with Ferrari's Lewis Hamilton a distant fifth.

Norris' victory cut Piastri's lead at the head of the championship to three points, with Verstappen dropping to 22 behind in third.

The race began amid uncertainty as to how the new rule imposed to increase jeopardy would play out, and amid predictions of wild strategies and potential chaos.

As it turned out, it was relatively straightforward for the front-runners, largely because the only intervention by the safety car was an early virtual one after a crash for Sauber's Gabriel Bortoleto on the first lap.

Norris converted his excellent pole position - his first since the season-opener in Australia - into a lead at the first corner as the top 10 moved off in grid order.

Norris negotiated both pit-stop periods as he, Leclerc and Piastri all followed the same strategy of starting on the medium tyre followed by two stints on the hard, splitting the race more or less into thirds.

Verstappen went into the race at a disadvantage in having only one set each of the medium and hard tyres available, which required him to use the softs.

Red Bull ran him on an inverted strategy starting on the hards and switching to the mediums and delayed his final pit stop as late as possible.

That left the Dutchman out in front after Norris, Leclerc and Piastri had made their second stops with about 28 laps to go.

It appeared as if Red Bull were hoping for a crash and a red flag, which would have allowed him to keep the lead and change to a third set of tyres for free.

The result was that Verstappen backed Norris into Leclerc and Piastri and closed up the top three, but no crash happened and Verstappen had to stop with one lap to go for his final set, dropping to fourth.