Crashes, stoppages and surprises highlight excellent Italy race!
The Italian Grand Prix always delivers. The start of the race already provided action with Carlos Sainz taking 2nd position for majority of the start of the race with his McLaren teammate Norris in 3rd. Ricciardo was sitting in 5th, behind Perez. A massive pit for many cars led to Stroll and Gasly climbing into podium positions. Magnussen’s car stopped early, taking him out of the race.
Albon was given a 5 second penalty for not allowing Magnussen space and hitting him, whilst Hamilton and Giovinazzi received 10 second penalties for pitting when the pit lane was closed. A huge part of the race which will lead to a different podium winner that isn’t Lewis Hamilton. This resulted in Hamilton having to come back from last place.
A race in which Ferrari won last year ended in despair this year as both Vettel and Leclerc’s cars stopped working with Leclerc’s car taking a heavy hit. This crash led to a subsequent red flag stoppage to clean the debris. This allowed Stroll a free pit stop which gave him a few advantage for the race to maintain podium position.
As the race restarted and both Hamilton and Giovinazzi took their penalties, Verstappen went to the pits and was officially out of the race. The Red Bull crew saw a problem with the engine and pitted him before it failed. His chance to capitalise on Hamilton’s penalty cannot be achieved now.
Although Stroll had the advantage, Gasly led after the restart in lap 28. Bottas was able to close the gap even closer between his team mate Hamilton in the championship. Hamilton had many of the fastest laps in order to get himself back into the race. He finished 8th in order to get some more points and extend his first place position.
Gasly had a great race and finished in his first ever poll position, and his second podium finish which he also achieved in Brazil in 2019. This is AlphaTauri’s first win since 2008. Sainz finished with his career high 2nd place whilst Lance Stroll finished 3rd to finish the podium spots.
Final Positions:
- Gasly
- Sainz
- Stroll
- Norris
- Bottas
- Ricciardo
- Hamilton
- Ocon
- Kvyat
- Perez
- Latifi
- Grosjean
- Raikonnen
- Russell
- Albon
- Giovinazzi
- Verstappen (DNF)
- Leclerc (DNF)
- Magnussen (DNF)
- Vettel (DNF)
Photo Source: GP Fans.