None of this year's early title contenders fared well in Monaco last season, with Piquet eventually claiming eleventh but Premat and Lapierre retiring. Viso, meanwhile, did not start well after more reliability problems and was then disqualified for running the red light at the end of pit-road. Hamilton thus heads into the weekend with the best memories of the circuit, while Ammermuller will be making his first appearance there.
Of course, there are others who return confident that they can master the intricacies of hooking the rain gullies and riding the right kerbs, with Carroll and Bruni naturally leading the way after claiming their 1-2 last season. The Italian arrives in the best championship position, having already claimed a maiden victory for Trident, but Carroll has been showing improved form of late, claiming points in Barcelona for his new team, Racing Engineering.
Of last year's top eight, only the first two and eighth-placed Sergio Hernandez return, the latter now with a currently scoreless Durango squad, while Olivier Pla, Alex Negrao, Clivio Piccione, Jose Maria Lopez, Fairuz Fauzy, Giorgio Pantano, Ferdinando Monfardini and Hiroki Yoshimoto all start this year with previous GP2 experience - although the Japanese driver echoed then BCN partner Viso's problems in 2005 and did not actually start the race.
Pantano makes an unexpected return this year, having only replaced Luca Filippi at FMS for the last round in Spain, but he brings greater experience of the venue than perhaps any other current GP2 pilot, having also raced there in F3000 and
F1. After finding his feet with the revised Dallara in Barcelona, the Italian is confident that he can continue to haul
Giancarlo Fisichella's team up the grid this weekend.
