FROM THE ENVIRONMENT TO MONZA. The qualifications of the Italian Grand Prix are the revenge of the trumpets Valtteri Bottas and Antonio Giovinazzi. The Finn, now a Mercedes driver and relegated to Alfa Romeo from 2022, will start from pole position in the sprint race on Saturday, the new format already tested at Silverstone. The Finn has taken a good revenge on his teammate, that Lewis Hamilton to whom he will give the position on the track if necessary. Max Verstappen settles for third time on a track he defines as difficult for Red Bull.
Taking into account that in Sunday’s race Bottas will be penalized by 10 positions at the start for having fitted the fourth engine, a new close confrontation between Verstappen, leader of the World Championship with a 3-point advantage, and Hamilton is easily foreseeable.
At the end of the session, there is Felipe Massa in the parts of the interviewer who reminds Hamilton of the world championship won in 2008 by one point. “Do you think about how important the three points of the sprint race can be?” Asks the former Ferrari driver. “Yes, it will be of the utmost importance to win. You too know what it means since you lost that championship by one point ».
Verstappen is satisfied: «On this track it is always difficult for us. I’m happy with third place, we will be closer in the race. We will be able to score a good number of points ».
Ferrari was behind, as expected and perhaps even more: Carlos Sainz is seventh, Charles Leclerc eighth with an engine brake problem «otherwise I would have finished one row ahead – says the Monegasque driver -. McLaren is strong here, our goal is to bring home some points and we will succeed ».
The other driver in the process of being torpedoed is Antonio Giovinazzi, the only Italian in the circus, tenth with Alfa Romeo. It is his second consecutive qualification in Q3 after that of Zandvoort. «I will try to be aggressive to defend the position and gain in view of the race. Monza is always special, but I’m always under pressure. Market rumors don’t interest me, I focus on doing well here ». Instead of rewarding him, they want to liquidate him to take the wealthy Chinese Zhou.
Formula 1 fails to avoid the theater of the wakes, which in addition to giving the impression of amateurs in disarray is also dangerous. This happens: the drivers try to have another car in front in the qualifying lap to take advantage of the wake effect, which in Monza can be worth up to almost half a second. The result is that everyone exits the garages at the same time. Even teammates join the fray at the same time: an Aston Martin mechanic was in danger of being run over. In Q1 in particular there were single-seaters lined up in a train at road speed. And to say that it is not the first time and the solution is easy: it would be enough to impose a minimum time in the launch lap.