If there’s one circuit on the calendar you could chose as a driver to finish on the top step of the podium, arguably it would be Autodromo Di Monza. Here, it’s more than just being a victor- it’s being humbled by getting your name etched on the very embodiment of F1 racing. This Sunday, La Pista Magica – the magic-track of Monza lived upto its name providing us with yet another enthralling race. It was, as they say, in its elements – from the beastly power of the cars to the Scuderia-crazy crowd painting the autodrome “red”; nose to tail racing up and down the field; drama on the track and in the paddock; a sweet victory for a Briton alongside an ecstatic Mexican finishing second.
The Start
Like we did in the preview, we want to point out that though the track appears deceptively simple, it offers challenges unique in their own way – the massive reliance on mechanical grip takes its toll on the brakes and the engine. While Pirelli engineers themselves predicted a one-stop strategy, most teams hate to take chances with them and were looking at pitting twice. So, all the frontrunners started on the medium options with Perez at 12th showing the first signs of stopping just once as he took the track on hard compounds. Monza, with its long straights is a circuit where DRS-assisted overtaking would be effective and hence was the first track this year with two DRS zones – the first one located 115 metres after the finish line with the activation on the entrance to the Parabolica, while the second 210 metres after the Lesmos in the run upto the Ascari with the activation before the second Lesmo corner. As we’ve already mentioned in the preview, two penalties were imposed on DiResta and Maldonado dropping them to 9th and 22nd on the grid. Among other changes, Ferrari replaced the whole anti-roll bar assembly on the back of Alonso’s car.
The five red lights went off – the engines roared as the noise in the stands reached its crescendo and the 81st Italian Grand Prix was a go. Hamilton got off to a smooth start ahead of the order while Button was clumsy getting of the box as Massa drove past him moving into P2. Going with the orders from Smedley, Massa drove in Hamilton’s tow on the longish straight getting very close to get a run on him on the outside but got squeezed out as they went into the apex at the Rettifilo. Meanwhile Alonso started paving his way up the field moving into 7th by the end of the first lap.
After an incident-filled start at Spa, it was a rather clean beginning with no major contact as Hamilton started extending his lead putting together a few fast laps. Vettel got past Schumacher by the fourth lap as did Alonso past Kimi moving into 4th and 6th positions respectively. We had our first retirement on lap nine when Jean-Eric Vergne’s Torro Rosso suddenly stopped on him as he applied the brakes on turn 1. The car pirouetted around hitting the kerb in the runoff and the nose vaulted up, making a massive impact as it landed. Vergne was lucky to walk out of the car complaining just about back pain.
Hamilton Closes In, Button Loses out
It was almost a re-run of Hungaroring as far as fates of the two drivers was concerned. As Hamilton looked in sublime touch winning a well-paced race, Button goofed up at the start of the race losing out to Massa but more decisively had to retire due to a fuel pick-up problem. Though Jenson believes nothing has changed after this race and there will be no team orders in the McLaren paddock anytime soon, with 78 points in deficit, the title it seems is beyond him. Meanwhile, it was a job well done for Hamilton as he controlled the pace of the race and won the race starting from pole. It was pitch perfect as it had been in Hungary extending the advantage in the first quarter and he created substantial buffer even as he cruised for most part that eventually helped him cover Perez’s late charge. Now come to think of it, throughout the race the focus wasn’t ever on him – while it meant a lack of action for the pole but bears a testament to how impressively he drove.
If only he chose to make news from behind the wheel than from his twitter feeds! The celebrity Hamilton has gotten the better of the driver Hamilton far too often this year with the shameful twitter fiasco drawing the last straw – “WTF, here are the telemetry traces everybody”. It has been impossible to fathom Lewis this season as the “driver” has sometimes shown elements of being the team man that Alonso has been so devoutly all along, while the “celebrity” has thrown tantrums and blamed the team for non-performance whenever he found it hard to deal with a few failures along the way. Even as these issues were coming to a rest, a fresh speculation started doing the rounds in the paddock at Monza suggesting a possible move for Hamilton to Mercedes in 2013. With Schumi almost certain for his second retirement after this season, Hamilton’s manager is looking at getting him a seat in Ross Brawn’s outfit in a bid to place him as a ‘major global star’. What remains to be seen is if he is willing to give up a better performing car on the track for bigger global branding - we hope he makes the decision in his right senses realizing that he is here to win races, fight for championship titles and move among F1’s highest echelon.
Charismatic Checo, perhaps a little too good
It was for the second time this season that the winner wasn’t the star of the race – both times it was the guy coming in behind him, both times it was a Sauber and both times it was FDA’s prodigy Sergio ‘Checo’ Perez. If Malaysia was proof of his immense skill at handling an F1 car (given the wet conditions), Monza was testimony to his ability to get the car to go as fast as it possibly could. Starting 12th after an unsatisfactory qualifying, he started on the hard compounds banking on a single pit-stop. That being said, it was this failure to get to Q3 that offered Sauber to start with primes giving him those extra laps in the first stint where he covered some ground on the front runners. But the effectiveness of this ploy seemed to unveil itself as he was left with 23 laps on the faster medium compounds as he rejoined in P8. He started getting a move on the rest of field and consistently lapped a second quicker than the leaders, lap 35 onwards. On lap 36 he almost made a brilliant overtaking move stick as he dived on the outside of Kimi’s Lotus around the second chicane taking over 5th position momentarily until Kimi got it back just ahead of the Lesmos. But the move was inevitable and was dutifully completed by him on the next lap as he out-braked Raikonnen going into the first corner and overtook him. He went on to displace Massa off the podium taking over P3 on the back straight heading into the Parabolica even without DRS. His P2 came after overtaking Alonso with seven laps to go on the start-finish straight.
At 22, he looks set for greatness. Only concern for him currently is his inability to get the car to work during the qualifying and start higher. There have been speculations throughout this season of him getting a seat at Ferrari next year – while there can be honour no greater than getting into a Ferrari cockpit, there may be a downside just from the perspective of his personal endeavours in F1. If we consider Alonso’s current status in the championship, the value of a subservient teammate in Massa is quite evident – the team’s one-driver operation of sorts is a huge advantage against rivals like Redbull and McLaren handicapped by internal conflict. So the question for Perez to answer for his own sake is, does he want to be a Sauber driver winning races or the support Ferrari driver “obliging with the team orders” for a bigger shark in Alonso! The matter may actually ease up without him having to make a choice as his performance today might be “a little too good” for Ferrari’s liking, given Alonso will still be their number one driver next season.
Conclusions
At the end of the thirteenth round Alonso stands at 179 points, 37 points clear of Hamilton at 142 who’s emerging as the one to be challenging him for the championship more than anybody else. After a luckless race at Spa and an unfortunate Q3, luck finally smiled on him as Vettel, Button and Webber retired. But nothing can be taken away from the way he kept a happy face amidst the problems and churned out a mammoth effort to finish third. Raikkonen is a close third in the championship with 141 and is win-less. He’s been a world champion before and if we may point out with the very last race of the season. But it’s time for Lotus to be the team they had threatened to be in the first half of the season. The Redbull’s seem to be losing a grip of things since Germany after the engine mapping furor and this week they’ve hit rock-bottom scoring no points at all. But it would be unfair to link this failure with a general listlessness we may have seen in their performances as it was a failed Renault alternator on Vettel’s car which forced him to retire – apparently it was a new alternator that was in place after the old one was replaced with a similar failure on Saturday morning. Nevertheless, the upshot is a visibly irritated Horner urging his team to throw everything into getting the Redbull’s back to winning ways.
Among points: L. Hamilton (McLaren), S. Perez (Sauber), F. Alonso (Ferrari), F. Massa (Ferrari), K. Raikkonen (Lotus), M. Schumacher (Mercedes), N. Rosberg (Mercedes), P. DiResta (Force India), K. Kobayashi (Sauber), B. Senna (Williams)
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