There was more to Marussia's Monaco breakthrough than a high attrition rate

Jules Bianchi's ninth place finish at Monaco (eighth across the line but with a five-second penalty) garnered the Marussia team its first ever championship points after four years of hard, underfunded toil.

Chilton was brought in for his stop on lap 24 and the plan was for Bianchi to come in the lap after. Then Sutil's crash brought out the safety car, making things especially awkward for Marussia. "The rules say you cannot take the five-second penalty under the safety car and they also say that if you do not take it at the next pit stop you're excluded," explained Lowdon. "But we weren't going to do another stop - and the stop we were making had been planned for that lap anyway, regardless of the safety car. So we decided we would take the penalty regardless. We were then penalised 5s for taking the original penalty under the safety car. So we effectively had the penalty twice." That was the difference between Bianchi's eighth over the line and the official classification of ninth. "It was a great drive by Jules. As well as his pass on Kamui, who is a world class driver, he pulled away from him and kept up a really strong pace. There was a lot of tyre management going on too and it required a really intelligent drive - and that's what he produced for us. We couldn't have asked for more." Chilton meanwhile, having made the unconventional choice of starting on the prime tyre, was one of the few on the option in the late stages when the fuel loads were at their lightest. It was this that contributed towards his seventh ranking in the fastest lap list. Again, less than it seemed on paper but illustrative of genuine progress. The team is adamant there is more performance to come, that the ideas and concepts are proven and that they just need to be able to afford to make them. The occasional Q2 starting slot would significantly enhance the feasibility of repeating the Monaco result. It's a hugely popular little team, its following out of all proportion to its results. Let's hope it can stay around to prove Monaco was no fluke. MH