< ► > Poignant tributes to Niki Lauda, including a solitary red baseball cap left hanging on his earphones peg, were all around the Mercedes team motorhome and their cars on Thursday morning as practice began for the Monaco Grand Prix. On a dry and hazy morning in the Mediterranean principality, the cramped harbourside paddock was in sombre mood as Formula 1 honoured the Austrian, who died overnight Monday aged 70. Like Mercedes, where he was a larger-than-life figure on the pit-wall as the team’s plain-speaking non-executive chairman, and Ferrari, with whom he won his first two championships, McLaren were also honouring the memory of the man and where he won his third...
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