MONACO, May 22, 2008 (AFP) - After four consecutive victories, the championship leading Ferrari team and their defending world champion Kimi Raikkonen are expecting to be the dominant force again in Monaco on Sunday.

The Finn, who leads this year´s title race ahead of his Ferrari team-mate Brazilian Felipe Massa, is convinced the Italian scuderia is in excellent shape as they bid to for victory on a track where they have not always proved strong.

Only three wins in the last two decades at the Monaco Grand Prix suggests that Ferrari produce cars usually more attuned to running on open circuits rather than the cramped steel-barrier-lined roads of the Mediterranean principality.

But Raikkonen said: "We are going to be very competitive again in Monaco, I feel sure of that. But there is a lot of work to do and a long way to go before we can talk about championships."

While Raikkonen arrives in calm and confident mood, his young rival, British tyro Lewis Hamilton, 23, is insistent that he can fire up his flagging title challenge with his first victory on his favourite circuit in a Formula One car.

He has collected impressive wins on the demanding streets around the harbour in all the junior formulae and just missed out on challenging for a win last year when he was a victim of team orders.

Fresh from spending an evening at the Cannes Film Festival with Miss Grenada Vivian Burkhard, with whom he was photographed, Hamilton has talked up his hopes.

"It is the grand prix every driver wants to win," Hamilton said.

"You have the history all around, you can just feel it, and the atmosphere is fantastic."

In testing for this weekend´s race, at the Le Castellet track close to Marseille, both McLaren and Ferrari posted fast times.

Hamilton was fastest on Tuesday, Raikkonen was fastest on Wednesday.

This suggests as always that the outcome of Sunday´s glittering showpiece event will be close and, as always, is likely to be decided on Saturday in the qualifying session.

There is so little room for overtaking on the narrow street track that the man who takes pole has the best opportunity to win by far providing he can make a clean start and keep a clear head.

But with heavy rain and cloudy conditions prevalent in the Cote d´Azur this week and forecast for the weekend, it may be not only the bikini-clad beauties on the yachts who are looking up hopefully at the skies.

At least Hamilton will not have to contend with the intra-team rivalry created by his former partner double world champion Spaniard Fernando Alonso this weekend.

Having returned to Renault, for whom he won in 2006, Alonso is bidding to complete a hat-trick of triumphs in the principality. He won last year in contentious circumstances for McLaren when they ordered Hamilton to follow him in second place.

Alonso has said it is "unrealistic" to expect him to win again having returned to Renault, but his replacement at McLaren Finn Heikki Kovalainen could turn out to be a major threat on a track that often springs a surprise.