Emotional and very dramatic Italian Grand Prix: McLaren celebrates, Hamilton and Verstappen crash

The fourteenth race of the season is over, and it was indeed a dramatic race! We witnessed two accidents, but one of them will take a long time to resolve. Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton collided with each other. The Italian Grand Prix has produced a sensational winner!

Saturday’s qualifying sprint already seemed to predict what Sunday’s race would look like in terms of the race speeds of the teams. And we had a clear picture right after the start.

Daniel Ricciardo made an absolutely brilliant start from his starting slot and was already ahead of second-placed Verstappen before the first corner. Hamilton and Lando Norris also had a close battle.

The seven-time world champion managed to get ahead of the McLaren driver for the moment. And in the very first chicane, there was a fierce duel.

Verstappen took the inside track, Hamilton the outside. In that duel, the Red Bull driver then gently pushed Hamilton off the track, but that was to be expected given the nature of this corner.

Hamilton subsequently fell behind Norris because of this manoeuvre. A few seconds later, we witnessed another dramatic moment on the exit of this chicane. Antonio Giovinazzi, who like Hamilton had gone off track, was shot down from behind by Carlos Sainz on his return to the circuit.

The sports commissaires assessed the situation as one that Giovinazzi himself had caused. He is said to have acted dangerously on his return to the track, closing off all of Sainz’s racing space.

Valtteri Bottas, who went from 19th to 13th in the opening five laps, certainly deserves praise. He’s been working his way up the order.

A critical moment for the Red Bull Racing stable came during Verstappen’s pit-stop. The right front wheel could not be tightened by the mechanics, so the Dutch driver was significantly delayed in the pits and dropped to tenth place.

However, on lap 26 there was a major collision between Verstappen and Hamilton. The British driver also had a slightly slower pit-stop, which meant that he was overtaken by Norris and almost Verstappen on the exit of pit lane.

And then, coming through turns one and two, both drivers collided.

Yellow flags were waved on the track, and the safety car was also necessary in this case. However, six laps later, he pitted and the race was back on. And here comes the last and decisive moment of the Italian Grand Prix.

Norris overtook second-placed Charles Leclerc shortly after the restart. And the lead hasn’t changed since lap 31!

McLaren has completely dominated the race at Monza. The winner was Daniel Ricciardo, with Norris coming in second. But that’s not all, the thirty-two year old Australian took an extra championship point for the fastest lap of the race on the last lap. He was also voted the best driver of the day.

McLaren has won a Formula One race for the first time in nine years. The last time the Woking team won a grand prix was in Brazil in 2012. That time, Jenson Button won the championship. For McLaren fans in particular, this triumph is very satisfying.

It should be noted – it is McLaren that deserves the full number of points from Sunday’s race. From the first to the last lap, they almost controlled the whole event and their racing form and speed was fabulous.

1. Ricciardo, 2. Norris, 3. Bottas, 4. Leclerc, 5. Pérez, 6. Sainz, 7. Stroll, 8. Alonso, 9. Russell, 10. Ocon, 11. Latifi, 12. Vettel, 13. Giovinazzi, 14. Kubica and 15. Mick Schumacher.

Apart from Hamilton and Verstappen, the Alpha Tauri drivers did not finish the race due to technical problems (Pierre Gasly and Júki Cunoda – the latter did not even enter the race).

Nikita Mazepin, whose Haas suffered a power unit failure, also retired on lap 44.

Source: F1 Live