Grand Prix 2019 Italian Grand Prix Practice, Qualifying & Race Discussion

What? The Italian GP thread is up and the Belgian race hasn't even taken place? Well, spoiler alert, Lewis took pole in Spa and won the race at a canter, Bottas was second and Max was third.

So, on to the temple of speed. A fixture of the F1 calendar since the first World Championship season (with the exception of a moment of silliness in 1980 when they went to Imola) Monza has given us the two fastest Grand Prix in Championship history.

1971, the days when the Monza low drag spec. was to take all the wings off and just drive round slip streaming the other cars until you got to the end. No chicanes, no compulsory tyre stops, no DRS, just balls out from start to finish. Chris Amon put his Matra on pole with a lap at over 156mph. Amon has the reputation of being a very unlucky driver and this race wasn't to be any different as he only finished 6th. The final laps are stunning to watch as the cars buzz around taking and overtaking one another again and again. Peter Gethin won the race in the BRM at an average speed of a smidge under 151mph and the first 5 cars crossed the line within 0.6 seconds of one another.

A few other oddities about 1971. Emerson Fittipaldi drove a four wheel drive, gas turbine engined Lotus 56B but it wasn't a Lotus it was entered by World Wide Racing. It was the first race for motor cycling World Champion Mike Hailwood. He led at various points, eventually finishing 4th. An English driver wouldn't win again until James Hunt stood on the top step in Holland in 1975.

2003, the time Michael Schumacher stood (almost) without equal in F1. Although he was being pushed hard by Juan Pablo Montoya in the 2003 season and before the race in Monza hadn't won a race since Canada. There were some games before the race as those using Michelin tyres had to cope with a small rule change on tyre widths which allowed the Bridgestone runners to get back on terms. Schumacher and Montoya pushed each hard through the race but Michael was just too quick. Even with two pit stops for tyres Schumacher averaged 153.8 mph for the race. This at a circuit with three chicanes to "slow the cars down".

What chance a new race record in 2019? The cars are fast enough, Kimi's pole lap in 2018 was 163.8 mph . Can we avoid a safety car?

Enjoy one of the shortest races of the season (about 1 1/4 hours) at the most historic circuit on the calendar.

 

[Angel]

Vettel has even more to worry about given he was handed another 3 points on his license for his dangerous move. That means he's just 3 points away from a race ban. It never rains but it pours.

Monza penalty leaves Vettel three points from race ban

Ferrari Formula 1 Driver Sebastian Vettel may be close to a race ban after his incident at the 2019 Formula 1 Italian Grand Prix at Monza

www.motorsport.com

 

[Publius Cornelius Scipio]

Yes, it looks like Ferrari has written Sebastian off and out. I cannot predict whether damage is permanent, but it is possibility and cannot be dismissed. On Ferrari website Vettel is hardly mentioned after last race at Monza.

I think that the problems between Vettel and Ferrari (or between Ferrari and Vettel) are deeper than that, just consider that thy never once gave him a car with a strong front end as he likes to drive. If you think about it it's amazing, they spent so much money but they never bothered to design a car that would suit the needs of their supposed lead driver. I also think that Vettel doesn't help them in not having a manager, he deals with them directly for any matter, this must be very difficult from a relationship point of view, a manager very often is there to smooth things out, to act as a go between etc, Vettel does everything by himself. Also I understand that people was not very happy when Vettel was writing down all the set up decisions on his copybook, apparently someone felt that he was double guessing them.

I personally think that Ferrari's reaction to Vettel's penalty in Canada was too weak, I guess that he felt betrayed, from then onwards he has never looked very focused, it's as if he has given up on them completely (to me it looks as if Ferrari had given up on him much earlier).

It would be interesting to see if he manages to find another car, IMHO his adventure at Ferrari is over.

One has to wonder how the relationship between Ferrari and Leclerc will look like in a couple of years time, Ferrari managed to ruin their relationship with all their recent lead drivers (Schumacher was dismissed while he still wanted to race, Kimi was paid not to race only to be hired again a few years later, Alonso was shown the door, Vettel now looks like an unwelcome guest there), in a sense Ferrari seems to share Ducati's ability to screw their chances by mismanaging their drivers.

 

[Izumi]

As usual with you, superior assessment of the situation, Publius. Sebastian might go back to RBR (maybe), or more likely to retire from racing. I find rather offensive (sorry for that) claims that car was specifically designed for him, because if that was the intent, they either missed the target through sheer incompetence, or they do not understand his driving style. At Monza he was openly angry at life when he provided tow for his teammate in Q3, and then was left (by people around him) in cold, looking like idiot.

I've bad feeling about the relationship being on rocks already about in 2016 during car launch, when I saw Ferrari management stepping back from Vettel, and crowding his teammates. Body language sometimes is more telling than words coming out of their mouth. The warm relationship Michael had, or Seb had at RBR was never replicated during his stay at Maranello IMO.

 

[Ruslan]

I think that if yesterday Leclerc had been driving a different car he would probably have ended up with a couple of punishments (not that I would necessarily agree with such punishments though)

This is exactly the issue. It is more than just an issue about what penalties should or should not be applied and how (which I think is a subject that people will always disagree on to some extent)....but it is the fact that there appear to be different rules on different days, at different tracks, for different drivers and apparently different teams. This needs to be corrected. I am not sure that anyone disagrees with this....yet FIA takes no concrete corrective action.

Just to clarify I watched the race on Sky Italia and they agreed that it was rather odd (including the fact that the stewards "noted" Leclerc cutting the chicane), I don't think that at Sky Italia they are biased against Ferrari, especially when one of the pundits is Marc Gene who to my knowledge still works for Ferrari

Thanks for that. I did watch the race with a friend. Both decisions seemed odd to both of us. We now get the British Sky TV broadcast, which is not bad, but not as good as the old "U.S." broadcast team of Hobbs-Matchett-Buxton.

 

[Ruslan]

Hard not to respond to this great post:

I think that the problems between Vettel and Ferrari (or between Ferrari and Vettel) are deeper than that, just consider that thy never once gave him a car with a strong front end as he likes to drive. If you think about it it's amazing, they spent so much money but they never bothered to design a car that would suit the needs of their supposed lead driver.

I started my career working with engineers, even though I was not one. There is sometimes a tendency for them to be over-focused on the engineering and not very focused on the people. I have seen this before, where the engineers do things that make sense from their perspective without consideration of human factors. I could give a number of stories from personal experience...but for example, NASA design the original Mercury capsule without a window. They were going to send the astronauts up in a space in a "tin can." Needless to say, when the original seven astronauts showed up and saw the capsule.......

I also think that Vettel doesn't help them in not having a manager, he deals with them directly for any matter, this must be very difficult from a relationship point of view, a manager very often is there to smooth things out, to act as a go between etc, Vettel does everything by himself. Also I understand that people was not very happy when Vettel was writing down all the set up decisions on his copybook, apparently someone felt that he was double guessing them.

Good point. It does help to have someone who can fight for you and leave your personal relationships not bruised.

I personally think that Ferrari's reaction to Vettel's penalty in Canada was too weak, I guess that he felt betrayed, from then onwards he has never looked very focused, it's as if he has given up on them completely (to me it looks as if Ferrari had given up on him much earlier).

It is clear that Vettel has not been the same since Canada. It appears he is de-motivated. Is this something that Binotto understands and knows how to correct?

It would be interesting to see if he manages to find another car, IMHO his adventure at Ferrari is over.

I think he will be there in 2020...but not sure after that.

One has to wonder how the relationship between Ferrari and Leclerc will look like in a couple of years time, Ferrari managed to ruin their relationship with all their recent lead drivers (Schumacher was dismissed while he still wanted to race, Kimi was paid not to race only to be hired again a few years later, Alonso was shown the door, Vettel now looks like an unwelcome guest there), in a sense Ferrari seems to share Ducati's ability to screw their chances by mismanaging their drivers.

Noted. My real introduction to Ferrari was reading Phil Hill's authorized biography (which is a great book). He ended poorly with Ferrari and was part of a big walk-out.

 

[Publius Cornelius Scipio]

I find rather offensive (sorry for that) claims that car was specifically designed for him, because if that was the intent, they either missed the target through sheer incompetence, or they do not understand his driving style.

If I remember correctly they never said that they tried to build a car to suit his driving style, in his first few years with Ferrari they said that James Allison had a very close relationship with Kimi and therefore the car was more to Kimi's liking, in the last couple of seasons they did the exact opposite of what Vettel seems to like, they gave him a car with very little front grip. I think that in the last few seasons there has been a lot going on at Ferrari, too many changes, maybe Vettel isn't the easiest to please, I don't know. But when you hear Mattia Binotto talking about his drivers it seems as if one is on top of the world and the other is a total failure, irrespective of the fact that on points Vettel is still marginally ahead.

I personally feel that Vettel is trying too hard to be a "nice guy", nice guys don't win, you need to be ruthless and I don't see him being very ruthless. What happened on Saturday was just undignified, ok Vettel had a point but I would have never gone public if I was him, the team didn't even try to defend him. As I said I don't know who's fault it is but the relationship seem to have hit the rocks.

I guess that Leclerc should enjoy the moment because what the media are writing about him now is what they were writing about Vettel only a couple of years ago

 

[Publius Cornelius Scipio]

There is sometimes a tendency for them to be over-focused on the engineering and not very focused on the people.


It does help to have someone who can fight for you and leave your personal relationships not bruised.


It is clear that Vettel has not been the same since Canada. It appears he is de-motivated. Is this something that Binotto understands and knows how to correct?


I think he will be there in 2020...but not sure after that.

I think that extreme engineering solutions are fine when they work, when Adrian Newey built cars with not enough for drivers to sit in no one could really complain that much since the cars were good. If a car is very extreme and it goes against the wishes of a driver AND it doesn't perform (like this year Ferrari who seems fast only on a straight line) then it become tougher to justify. For a rookie like Leclerc everything is an improvement compared to what he had before and he probably sees mostly the upside, for someone used to having the best gear like Vettel it must be frustrating.

I think that Vettel needs someone who he can talk with.

I'm not sure that Binotto understand how to motivate his drivers, from the outside it doesn't look very promising. In a sense for Vettel it all went downhill since Marchionne passed away.

I'm not so sure that he'll be around next year, a lot of people seem to be confident that Ricciardo will be asked to replace him (I don't think that Ricciardo would be a very easy team mate for Leclerc)

 

[Ruslan]

I think that Vettel needs someone who he can talk with.

Yep.

I'm not sure that Binotto understand how to motivate his drivers, from the outside it doesn't look very promising. In a sense for Vettel it all went downhill since Marchionne passed away.

In the end, management is about leading people. This is not something that a lot of otherwise capable people are good at.

I'm not so sure that he'll be around next year, a lot of people seem to be confident that Ricciardo will be asked to replace him (I don't think that Ricciardo would be a very easy team mate for Leclerc)

I assume Ricciardo is under contract with Renault next year. I think Vettel is also under contract. I also don't think Ferrari has a lot of other options.

 

[F1Brits_90]

Was great to see Michael Masi come out and explain the reasoning behind the penalty decisions with Anthony Davidson at the sky pad after the race.View attachment 12862

when it is uploaded I will post it on here for everyone to watch

 

[Bleu]

Vettel has even more to worry about given he was handed another 3 points on his license for his dangerous move. That means he's just 3 points away from a race ban. It never rains but it pours.

Monza penalty leaves Vettel three points from race ban

Ferrari Formula 1 Driver Sebastian Vettel may be close to a race ban after his incident at the 2019 Formula 1 Italian Grand Prix at Monza

www.motorsport.com

Taking account next year it might be even tougher - it's five points and 15 races to go based on provisional calendar.

 

[FB]

Who is Ferrari's reserve driver?

 

[RasputinLives]

They don't have one officially. Two out of the four test drivers have super licence though. Pascal Wrehlein and Brendan Hartley.

Ferrari obviously do their usual trick of hoovering up the drivers out of contract who have some inside knowledge of their rivals set up.

 

[F1Brits_90]

Who is Ferrari's reserve driver?

from what ive heard giovinatzzi would take vettel seat & ericsson would be in alfa romeo

 

[Il_leone]

5 years at Ferrari - $200m salary ( $40m a year)

0 titles

2015 - 3wins
2016 - 0 wins
2017 - 5 wins
2018 - 5 wins
2019 - 0 wins so far

More wins than Alonso but going to end up the same way leaving Ferrari bitter. James Hunt once said a lot of drivers fail to recover from their experience at Ferrari because it is such a shock to them. Vettel is on that downward spiral, the next 7 races for Vettel are critical to what might lie ahead of him for 2020.

DC even said the writing is on the wall for Vettel at Ferrari on Sunday which may sound harsh but could be true

 

[olegg]

It's strange but I'm even little sorry Vettel.
I hope that in the remaining races Vettel will be able to return to the fight.

 

[Angel]

I'm not sure Ferrari will let Vettel return to the fight. Leclerc has more points than him now and two wins to zero, I can see them getting behind Leclerc and demotivating Vettel even further. I'll be surprised if he doesn't move teams or retire at the end of this year the way things are going for him.

 

[vintly]

If Leclerc beats him fair and square in Singapore then Vettel's definitely in trouble. But he's electric round there, I expect him to beat Leclerc.

 

[Angel]

If Leclerc beats him fair and square in Singapore then Vettel's definitely in trouble. But he's electric round there, I expect him to beat Leclerc.

True, that's why I bet on Vettel in the You Bet game

 

[F1Brits_90]

Vettel did beat Leclerc albeit on different pit strategy In hungary on circuit that is as twisty as Singapore is. but they were the 3rd best team comfortably or uncomfortably. so he could do it but its not just pace in Singapore its the concentration & mental fatigue that will play a big factor. because we talking about a race is always as close to a endurance race because its 2hr of pure concentration & 1 lapse your in wall