F1 Talk: Magical Monza produces a classic

It was an incredible weekend of Formula One action in Italy and despite all of the pre race talk of Ferrari taking an easy win for the first time in eight years, Lewis Hamilton was on phenomenal form and had something to say about it.

I had my concerns that the Italian GP would be a bit of a borefest as it has been over the years. Sunday’s race was anything but. However, Saturday was a big talking point and had an influence on the race results.

Kimi Raikkonen took pole position to the delight of the Tifosi and much of the F1 world. It was a sublime lap. Everyone wanted a slipstream from the car in front so we saw lots of gamesmanship between the teams as to not be the first car out of the pits or else you would just be towing a train of cars along.

Interestingly, Ferrari sent Raikkonen out after Vettel so the former would benefit from a nice slipstream all the way around the 5.79KM lap. You would think it would be the other way round so that Vettel would have a better chance to start on pole. That said, Vettel still got a slipstream from Hamilton. Not as much though.

The tows on the final runs:

Hamilton started his lap 3.2 seconds behind Bottas

Vettel started his lap 3.7 seconds behind Hamilton

Raikkonen started his lap 2.5 seconds behind Vettel

I still think it was the cleaner lap from Raikkonen which earned him his first pole since Monaco in 2017. The fastest ever lap in history set by Juan Pablo Montoya was broken a few times over qualifying and Raikkonen may hold onto his new record, with an average speed of 162.9MPH, for a while because the new front wings for next year will slow the cars down. Teammate, Vettel, wasn’t happy though but he was still ahead of Hamilton which was the main thing and he surely knew he had a very good chance of winning the race.

Why was Vettel so angry? Points are on Sunday, not Saturday and, he was still on the front row in a Ferrari at Monza of all places.

It seems his head wasn’t in the right place 24 hours later as well. A clean start for the top three cars would get messy by the time they reached the second chicane.

Hamilton got a nice run out of the first chicane on Vettel but then very strangely Vettel moved his car over to the left to think about overtaking Raikkonen when he was nowhere near close enough. It left a nice space to Vettel’s right and Hamilton went for it and put a good move on his championship rival.

But, Vettel understeered (perhaps due to the turbulent air of Raikkonen just a car length or so ahead) and made light contact with Hamilton’s sidepod which sent him into a 180 degree spin. He smashed the throttle out of frustration, lit up the rear tyres, and found himself in last place. The contact was a pure racing incident, you can’t blame Vettel for that.

What you can blame him for is putting himself in that position. He should have been thinking about defending from Hamilton, not attacking Raikkonen. I feel like Vettel wanted to win “too much” if there was ever a thing and he didn’t think about the big picture. He was attempting to win at Monza in three different cars but he made a big mess of it. It all goes back to qualifying and had it been Vettel ahead of Raikkonen the race would have been very different.

The same can be said if Vettel was second after the opening lap. Would Hamilton have been able to overtake two Ferraris? I doubt it, Ferrari would have had so many more strategical options and wouldn’t have found themselves in a Mercedes trap.

A safety car came out very early on for the first time in seven years at Monza after Brendon Hartley got literally sandwiched between two cars and his race was over before the Kiwi even got to the first corner. Not what he needs when the F1 driver market is in chaos and Hartley is fighting to stay in the sport.

The safety car saved Vettel slightly because his front wing was damaged so a pitstop under green flag conditions would have made his day a lot worse and he would have struggled to get into the top 5.

On the restart, Raikkonen went far too early as he started to step on the loud pedal coming out of Ascari so Hamilton could easily sit in his slipstream all the way down to Parabolica. Raikkonen realised so he backed out if it before the final corner (which you aren’t technically allowed to do) but it wasn’t enough to stop Hamilton from charging down the main straight and taking the lead going into the first chicane.

Raikkonen responded and got a run down to the second chicane and swooped around the outside of Hamilton in the braking zone to retake the lead. Clean hard racing, that would go on for nearly the rest of the race.

Mercedes almost forced Raikkonen to pit earlier than Ferrari wanted by making their mechanics rush out to their pit box so it looked like they were about to bring one of their cars in. They did this a handful of times. It’s not really allowed but what penalty do you give? Who do you give it to? You can’t give it to the drivers. Is it fair? Probably not but I don’t made it personally because it makes the pitstop phase much more exciting and you can play a lot of games to try and outfox your rivals.

Raikkonen’s stop was clean and he then set off lighting up the timing screens on his new set of soft tyres whilst Hamilton was giving it “hammer time.” Mercedes did the right thing by leaving Hamilton out there for eight more laps because his lap times weren’t too bad. He was losing time to Raikkonen but there was a trap in place for the Finn.

Valtteri Bottas had been battling Max Verstappen for the first stint of the race but Mercedes didn’t respond to Verstappen’s pitstop, they left Bottas out there to slow Raikkonen down. Hamilton came out 4-5 second behind Raikkonen after his pitstop but easily made the time back up as Raikkonen couldn’t get past his fellow Finn.

Clever tactics from Mercedes and it helped Bottas’s race because he was effectively on a similar strategy to Hamilton because he would have young tyres at the end to attack Verstappen. I thought Bottas would stay out for a little longer but it became apparent that Raikkonen’s tyres were degrading severely.

Huge blisters appeared on his rear tyres as his car visibly slid more and more. The trick with the current tyres is to now push at your absolute maximum as soon as you’ve fitted a new set of tyres in. You have to go 90-95% and not slide them in the high speed corners. It’s hard to do. Ferrari should have told Raikkonen to catch Bottas as slowly as possible because Hamilton was always going to come out behind after his pitstop.

Raikkonen, and Ferrari in fact, are usually very good on their tyres but on Sunday, they suffered more than Mercedes did. Even in the opening stint, Hamilton was able to stay within 1.5 seconds of Raikkonen which in theory should mean his tyres would drop off significantly but they didn’t. Both drivers were impressive but Hamilton was on another level.

He overtook Raikkonen with nine laps to go at the first chicane and this time, Raikkonen couldn’t fight back. Raikkonen could have been a bit more forceful to stop Hamilton from overtaking him but he kept it clean and gave away the lead. With the state of his tyres, it was an inevitability and he was lucky to get to the end without needing an extra pitstop or suffering a puncture.

The Italian GP was by far Raikkonen’s best chance to win a race but it was always going to be hard when it’s two against one. He did get his 100th podium but the Tifosi were not happy that a driver wearing red wasn’t victorious.

The boos were very loud and clear for not just Hamilton but Bottas as well. It always happens at Monza though. I wouldn’t boo personally but it just shows the passion of the Tifosi, if you beat a Ferrari when fighitng for the top sports then you’re going to get booed. I’m sure if Hamilton becomes a Ferrari driver in the future then they won’t boo him then.

While all that was going on, Max Verstappen found himself in a race-long battle with Bottas. He defended very well and drove just as well as Hamilton to keep a much faster car behind him, until he pushed things a little too far.

Bottas got alongside him going into turn one and Verstappen was covering the inside but moved back over to the racing line, where Bottas was positioned. He left a few centimetres less than a car’s width in my opinion. I love to see hard defending like Verstappen does but I can see why the FIA didn’t like it and why they gave hima 5 second time penalty. If they let him get away with it then it would have set a precedent that could create some unnecessary collisions.

Then, Verstappen continued to defend ruthlessly even though he knew he was slowing himself and Bottas up with Vettel catching. He said “I don’t care” and “they’re killing racing” over the team radio which I found quite funny but it shows he perhaps still has a bit to learn mentally in the sport of F1. The young Dutchman won the battle for third on track, but ended up being classified fifth.

Away from the front, Romain Grosjean was disqualified from the race after Renault protested the legality of the Haas floor. Monza was the final race they could do it, which is a bit strange. I presume that if they didn’t protest on Sunday then Haas would get away with their car for the rest of the year, even if it was illegal.

Anyway, the protest was successful and Grosjean lost his 6th place which is crucial for the constructors’ championship as Haas are just 10 points behind Renault in the battle for 4th place.

The reference plane of car number 08 is found not to be in compliance with Article 3.7.1 d” (i.e. the floor of Grosjean’s car)

Esteban Ocon and Sergio Perez collected more points for Racing Point Force India. They are moving themselves up the constructors’ championship slowly but surely and could get back to 6th place which would be staggering. Perez went out in Q1 in Saturday after the team misjudged the cut off point but recovered finely the next day.

Williams also got a double points finish and after Grosjean’s disqualification, Sergey Sirotkin got his first points, well point, of the season. Never has every driver in the field scored at least a point in a season so unless a new driver comes in at some point this year (for example Robert Kubica does a few races) then we will get an F1 first.

Sauber had a disappointing weekend to say the least. After a DRS failure for Marcus Ericsson in FP2 which rolled the car over ferociously, the team had to revert to an old rear wing which severely compromised the rest of their weekend. Charles Leclerc hasn’t impressed for a long time now and it’s happening at the wrong time for him if he wants that Ferrari seat.

We had a lot of great racing on Sunday throughout the midfield mainly because it’s so close between them all. Less than two tenths split a dozen cars or something ridiculous like that in the first part of qualifying and we got some fantastic wheel the wheel action during the race. It was every man for himself.

Kevin Magnussen cut the chicanes to keep positions, or even gain places! Fernando Alonso was aggressive as I have ever seen, only to retire due to an electrical issue. The Renaults and Williams were battling each other, so much happened that I’m sure not all of it was shown on the TV coverage.

With the flyaways about to begin, momentum will play its part in the championship. I don’t think there is a clear favourite. Ferrari have the slightly better qualifying car but the race car is pretty equal between Mercedes and Ferrari. Will Bottas and Raikkonen have to play a number 2 role for the rest of the season? I think so, but how extreme will it get I wonder?

There’s so much to play out and if we get more races like the Italian Grand Prix then we’re set for a thrilling finale.