LEWIS Hamilton overcame an early accident and wet conditions last night to win the Monaco Grand Prix and take the lead in the title race.

The McLaren driver, who started third on the grid, finished three seconds ahead of BMW Sauber's Robert Kubica, while pole-sitter Felipe Massa, of Ferrari, was third at Formula One's most famous race.

'That was a fantastic job as always,' a pumped-up Hamilton said to his team over the radio.

'I apologise for hitting the barrier.

'Let's go party tonight.'

The 23-year-old Briton swiped the wall early on but took advantage of Massa's mistake on the slick street circuit to earn his sixth career win.

Massa, starting from pole, ran off the track 25 laps in to lose the lead with Hamilton able to make up the difference.

Hamilton improved to 38 points in the overall standings, three better than defending world champion Kimi Raikkonen, who finished out of the points in ninth. The Ferrari driver's poor day began with a drive-through penalty and culminated with an accident involving Force India driver Adrian Sutil.

Massa is third with 34 points and Kubica next on 32.

Hamilton hung on despite seeing a 40-second advantage erased with 20 minutes remaining when the safety car emerged after Nico Rosberg of Williams crashed.

Red Bull's Mark Webber was fourth ahead of Sebastian Vettel of Toro Rosso. Rubens Barichello of Honda, Kazuki Nakajima of Williams and Heikki Kovalainen rounded out the places in the points.

The morning rain came and went as drivers took on the tight street circuit without the banned driver aids that help improve traction control.

Kovalainen, fourth on the grid, had to start last after stalling before the formation lap.

Hamilton was sandwiched between the Ferraris after moving ahead of Raikkonen in a clean start for the 20-car field.

Showers picked up and shooting spray caused lap times to be nearly 20 seconds slower than Saturday's qualifying and Hamilton pitted six laps in after his right rear tyre brushed the wall.

David Coulthard lost control of his Red Bull car for the second straight day to crash out before Toro Rosso's Sebastien Bourdais reared into him to bring out the safety car for the first time. Six drivers would retire as the 78-lap race was transformed into a clock countdown with Hamilton in front at the end.

DRIVE-THROUGH PENALTY

Raikkonen was then dealt a drive-through penalty for not fitting his tyres in time to start the race and the Finn dropped to fourth behind Hamilton, with Kubica trailing Massa.

Hamilton, who won a wet Japan GP last year, was 17 seconds ahead with half of the 78 laps raced.

With the track drying out, Hamilton set another fastest lap - three seconds better than Massa - to push out.

The McLaren driver was clear with only the weather to worry about after a quick pit after 54 laps and the dry tyres fitted.

Sutil was set to score Force India's first points with a fourth-place finish before Raikkonen under-braked to run into him with seven minutes remaining.

The glamour of Monaco's race carried into the pit lane with film director Quentin Tarantino, actress Michelle Yeoh, entertainment mogul Sean 'P Diddy' Combs and former tennis star Boris Becker all on hand.

AP

RACE START

THIS was the first Grand Prix race of the season that started on a wet track.

Once the five red lights went off, the Monaco Grand Prix was underway. Going into the first corner, Lewis Hamilton managed to sneak past Kimi Raikkonen for second place with a superb launch from the grid.

Fernando Alonso was the other driver who got a stunning start, the two-time world champion snaked past two cars to move up to fifth from seventh on the grid.

On the whole it was a cautious start from the entire field as there were no retirees from Lap 1.

RACE ACTION

VERY early in the race, McLaren's Lewis Hamilton misjudged the distance of the barriers and clipped his rear tyre against the barrier. He was forced into the pit early for a change of tyres and more fuel.

Hamilton rejoined in fourth position.

The next piece of action came from David Coulthard who couldn't get enough grip on the wet surface and oversteered his car straight into the barriers. Amazingly, Sebastien Bourdais made the same mistake in the same place and slammed into Coulthard. Both of them were forced to retire. The safety car was forced out for three laps.

Next, Felipe Massa almost threw away his race by going into the barriers at the same place Hamilton did, but he did extremely well to control the car with quick reflexes and suffered no damage. A few laps later Massa made a second mistake, going too late on the brakes, he was forced to use the exit road and lost the race lead to Kubica.

The main talking point of this race was definitely Force India's Adrian Sutil, who after the first quarter of the race found himself sitting in sixth place from an 18th-place start. Sutil continued to do well, even lapping McLaren's Heikki Kolvalainen and getting a fastest lap in the process. Sutil's luck ended when Raikkonen lost control of his car and slammed straight into the back of his car forcing him to retire whilst Raikkonen only suffered a damaged front wing. Raikkonen then moved up into fourth.

Nico Rosberg was the last casualty of the day when he caught a wet patch on the track and completely lost control of his car, ricocheting across the barriers. Thankfully, he suffered no injuries.

All the action finally ended after a very exciting two hours on Lap 76 out of 78 as F1 races are not allowed to go pass the two-hour mark.

RACE STRATEGY

THIS was another one of those races where choosing the wrong tyre would cost you dearly.

The entire field started the race on intermediate tyres as they didn't expect a heavy downpour. Renault's Fernando Alonso was one of the first to gamble with full slicks as the track started to dry. He struggled early on and was unable to get an advantage over the rest of the field.

On the whole teams that gambled with one-stop strategies did much better in this race as there were many stops by the safety car.

RACE SUMMARY

THIS was definitely another action packed weekend of racing.

Monaco is usually a circuit which doesn't deliver much entertainment but with the rain, we received a full two hours of fun.

For me, the driver of the day was definitely Force India's Adrian Sutil who started the race in 18th and at one point even found himself in fourth but was forced to retire.

Even though it was a wet race, the entire field did extremely well as 15 out of 20 drivers managed to finish the race.

Lewis Hamilton did extremely well. He had a slight slip-up early in the race but did extremely well with stunning pace in the wet and dry to come back and win the race.

I'm now looking forward to the Montreal race in two weeks.