Max Verstappen won the Formula One Italian Grand Prix on Sunday after some late safety car drama to leave himself in touching distance of his second straight Formula One title.
Championship leader Verstappen claimed his first win at Monza and his fifth GP in a row after fighting from seventh on the grid to finish ahead of Charles Leclerc on another difficult day for Ferrari.
The race ended with jeers from the crowd and Ferrari frustration as the drivers had to finish the final six laps with the safety car after Daniel Ricciardo lost his engine and ended up at the side of the track.
However Red Bull’s Verstappen is 116 points ahead of Leclerc in the drivers’ standings and can retain his crown in Singapore next month after winning his 11th race of the season, one he largely controlled despite being hit with a grid penalty on Friday.
“It was unfortunate, everyone wants to finish under a green flag, but unfortunately we were short of laps,” Verstappen told reporters.
“But I had new softs so I wasn’t too worried.”
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The massed ranks of red in the stands loudly voiced their disapproval when the cars came over the line as they were denied the chance to see their man Leclerc try to overtake dominant Verstappen, who was also booed on the podium by Italian supporters.
“The end was frustrating, I wish could have had a bit of racing at the end, unfortunately we were second because of what happened before,” said Leclerc.
The Monegasque lost out to Verstappen despite starting on pole but said after the race it had been “a positive weekend overall” despite Ferrari’s plan of changing from soft to medium tyres during an early virtual safety car backfiring.
“I think we all had the doubt, I think if I hadn’t done it Max would have done it,” said Leclerc.
“It was a bit unfortunate because in the middle of the pit lane we have the virtual safety car ending so we didn’t have any of the benefit of stopping at that moment and from that moment we were on the back foot.”
George Russell of Mercedes rounded off the podium, while Leclerc’s teammate Carlos Sainz surged from 18th on the starting grid to fourth.
- Ferrari fall short -
Seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton also raced from the back of the Mercedes to finish an impressive fifth while a delighted Nyck de Vries scored points on his F1 debut by finishing ninth as a stand-in for Williams’ Alex Albon.
Hamilton later told Sky Sport Italia that the finish “brought back memories” of last season’s controversial climax in Abu Dhabi, where Verstappen snatched the title on the final lap of the campaign.
“It always brings memories back. That is the rule that it should be, right?” Hamilton said.
“There’s only one time in the history of the sport where they haven’t done the rules like that today and that’s the one where it changed the result of the championship. But it is what it is.”
Mercedes boss Toto Wolff also weighed in, saying: “I think this time they followed the rules.
“Maybe they could have done it a lap sooner, and they accepted the race ends under the Safety Car.
“This is how it should be.”
Ferrari boss Mattia Binotto slammed the FIA for being “caught sleeping” at the end of the race, saying that Leclerc was robbed of a chance to compete for the win at the death.
“Today we had all the conditions to have a restart of the race, I don’t know why they waited so long,” Binotto told Sky Italy after the race.
“The FIA has been caught sleeping, maybe they are not yet ready to deal with these situations.”
Asked if the rules need to be changed, he said: “No, I don’t think it’s a matter of changing the rules. The rules have been discussed, largely, especially after Abu Dhabi last year.
“They were discussed with the FIA, F1 and the teams, and we came to a conclusion that the current format is probably the right one to keep. So I don’t think it’s a matter of regulations today.
“I am certainly disappointed for how long it took them to decide, and I think we are not understanding why it took so long to release the cars between the safety car and the leader.”
Despite Verstappen benefitting from the situation, Red Bull boss Christian Horner said he believed there was ample time to re-start the race.
“We don’t want to win a race under a safety car,” Horner told Sky F1. “And that’s something that we’ve talked about for many, many years that they should finish racing. There was enough time to get that race going. I think they picked up the wrong car, they picked up George Russell.
“We had the faster car, and we would have liked to have won the race on the track, not behind the safety car. So we share the disappointment of all the fans because it took away a grandstand finish.”
Key to the delay was that the safety car came out in front of Russell in third, and not Verstappen in first, meaning far more time was needed in restoring the correct race order before racing could resume.
Nonetheless, the FIA defended its decision, saying that issues in recovering Ricciardo’s car were to blame for the delay instead.
“While every effort was made to recover Car #3 quickly and resume racing, the situation developed and marshals were unable to put the car into neutral and push it into the escape road,” the FIA said in a statement.
“As the safety of the recovery operation is our only priority, and the incident was not significant enough to require a red flag, the race ended under safety car following the procedures agreed between the FIA and all Competitors.
“The timing of the safety car period within a race has no bearing on this procedure.”
Meanwhile, Ricciardo experienced another new low in the final stages of his McLaren career, retiring for the second time this season due to an oil leak.
Ricciardo had overtaken Lando Norris to move into third at the start but started dropping back before his race came to a premature end.
“It was nice to start at the front and get a decent start. Lando looked like he had a poor start so I got ahead of him and it was nice to be in third there, but I saw quickly Max (Verstappen) was right behind me and he was obviously on another level,” Ricciardo said. “I was just trying to set a rhythm in fourth, but we weren’t quick enough.
“I felt like I was doing a good job to hold off Gasly but didn’t have much more to show than that. It was a busy race, trying to hold on, do what I could and then yeah, felt like we got a little bit of a rhythm on the hards (tyreS) with 10-15 laps to go but then the engine just switched off out of Turn Six.
“I had to pull over straight away because it was stuck in gear and so I couldn’t roll to a safe place. It would have been nice to get some points but it wasn’t meant to be today.”
Leclerc started on pole and held off an early overtake attempt from Russell to keep first place while Verstappen was already bursting through to second by lap five.
Verstappen took the lead on lap 13 when the virtual safety car was introduced after Sebastian Vettel crashed out and Leclerc pitted, a move which would eventually cost Ferrari the race.
Verstappen pitted on lap 26 to change from his softs to mediums and rejoined the fray just behind Leclerc with the same compound in which his Ferrari rival had already driven around the track 13 times.
That tyre wear made the difference when Leclerc handed Verstappen the win by pitting again to go back to softs seven laps later.
Ricciardo’s race ended with six laps remaining and with his car stuck beside the track that allowed everyone to pit knowing a safety car would come out.
What they didn’t know was that the car would remain on the track until the end of the race, meaning Verstappen strolled over the line for a victory which would likely have come regardless.
GP result
1. Max Verstappen (NED/Red Bull) 1hr 20min 27.511sec
2. Charles Leclerc (MON/Ferrari) at 2.446
3. George Russell (GBR/Mercedes) 3.405
4. Carlos Sainz Jr (ESP/Ferrari) 5.061
5. Lewis Hamilton (GBR/Mercedes) 5.380
6. Sergio Perez (MEX/Red Bull) 6.091
7.Lando Norris (GBR/McLaren-Mercedes) 6.207
8. Pierre Gasly (FRA/AlphaTauri-Red Bull) 6.396
9. Nyck de Vries (NED/Williams-Mercedes) 7.122
10. Zhou Guanyu (CHN/Alfa Romeo) 7.910
11. Esteban Ocon (FRA/Alpine-Renault) 8.323
12. Mick Schumacher (GER/Haas-Ferrari) 8.549
13. Valtteri Bottas (FIN/Alfa Romeo) one lap
14.Yuki Tsunoda (JPN/AlphaTauri-Red Bull) one lap
15.Nicholas Latifi (CAN/Williams-Mercedes) one lap
16. Kevin Magnussen (DEN/Haas-Ferrari) one lap
Drivers championship
1. Max Verstappen (NED) 335 pts
2. Charles Leclerc (MON) 219
3. Sergio Perez (MEX) 210
4. George Russell (GBR) 203
5. Carlos Sainz Jr (ESP) 187
6. Lewis Hamilton (GBR) 168
7. Lando Norris (GBR) 88
8. Esteban Ocon (FRA) 66
9. Fernando Alonso (ESP) 59
10. Valtteri Bottas (FIN) 46
11. Pierre Gasly (FRA) 22
12. Kevin Magnussen (DEN) 22
13. Sebastian Vettel (GER) 20
14. Daniel Ricciardo (AUS) 19
15. Mick Schumacher (GER) 12
16. Yuki Tsunoda (JPN) 11
17. Zhou Guanyu (CHN) 6
18. Lance Stroll (CAN) 5
19. Alexander Albon (THA) 4
20. Nyck de Vries (NED) 2
21. Nicholas Latifi (CAN) 0
22. Nico Hulkenberg (GER) 0
Constructors
1. Red Bull 545 pts
2. Ferrari 406
3. Mercedes 371
4. Alpine-Renault 125
5. McLaren-Mercedes 107
6. Alfa Romeo 52
7. Haas-Ferrari 34
8. AlphaTauri-Red Bull 33
9. Aston Martin-Mercedes 25
10. Williams-Mercedes 6
