Five Things We Learned from the Italian Grand Prix

The twelfth round of the 2015 Formula One world championship took us to the Autodromo Nazionale Monza for the Italian Grand Prix. Lewis Hamilton eased to his seventh victory of the season ahead of home team Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel who simply had no answer to the pace the reigning champion was able to articulate. There was more drama off-track when Hamilton was made to wait over three hours post-race to get his victory affirmed as stewards investigated his Mercedes team for infringing recommended starting tyre pressure limits.While both Force India drivers were able to finish sixth and seventh on the high-speed track - which tend to suit them the most, Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo and Daniil Kvyat worked their strategies out to bag five points. Here are the top five moments from the Italian Grand Prix:

#1 A well-defined tyre pressure protocol needed:

Formula One’s uncanny nature of off-track incidents dwarfing exponentially what was on it took a spectacular turn when Lewis Hamilton shattered the morale at Monza by winning with a margin of over 25 seconds before summoned to stewards for a post-race investigation of allegedly infringing the minimum starting tyre pressure requirements. It was all a smooth sailing for the Briton who led from pole position comfortably and extended his lead to Vettel by over 20 seconds until the closing stages of the 53 lap race.

The reigning world champion was asked by his race engineer Peter Bonnington to push harder to stretch his lead further without any explanation for the cause. There was an air of uncertainty prevailed in the Mercedes pits which blatantly revealed that the German team was expecting to alleviate time penalty by broadening the lead. The seemingly unending post-race deliberation continued for three hours as the left-rear tyre of Hamilton’s Mercedes W06 car was measured just before lights out on the grid to be 0.3psi below the minimum starting tyre pressure of 19.5psi strictly mandated by Pirelli for safety reasons in the wake of two tyre blowouts that marred the Spa weekend.

The Briton’s seventh victory of the season in his 160th race was upheld when stewards ruled that tyre pressures were at Pirelli’s recommended level “when they were fitted to the car” in the garage. Their detailed probe into what caused the temperatures in the tyres on both Hamilton and Rosberg’s car to drop when evaluated on the grid explained that the heated tyre blankets used to keep the tyres warm were unplugged at a lower than permitted temperature thus in turn the tyre pressures would have been dipped below the level recommended. The FIA stewards’ statement read,

“the tyre warming blankets had been disconnected from their power source, as is a normal procedure, and the tyres were significantly below the maximum permitted tyre blanket temperature at the time of the FIA's measurement on the grid.”

Before the race start, four cars in the first two rows: Hamilton, Raikkonen, Vettel and Rosberg had undergone tyre pressure checks. The results between them varied as the Ferraris were found to be above the minimum starting tyre pressure required while Hamilton was below 0.3psi and Rosberg on a deficit of 1.1psi. From the investigation’s outcome, it can be perceived that if the German driver had finished the race, he wouldn’t have been penalised as well.

With Pirelli’s conservative tyre pressure choices and to ward off such investigations again, an accurately outlined procedure should be emphasised for measuring tyre pressures as suggested by FIA stewards and also the man in charge for the German outfit. Mercedes’ Team Prinicipal Toto Wolff explained,

"You check the tyre pressures in the tyre heaters when you put them on the car,"

"This is the moment, because you could say 'when is the moment you should check them? Five minutes? Eight minutes from the end, when the red lights go on?'

"I think it is about defining the procedure – and the moment when those pressures are checked – in the future.

"We don't know why we had such a discrepancy. At the end of the day, it can cost performance if you have one tyre that has a different pressure than the others."

#2 Rosberg\'s title hopes up in flames:

It’s fair to say that Nico Rosberg’s best opportunity of taking the drivers’ championship lead going into the summer break was lost in Hungary where a late lap collision with Ricciardo meant he went from finishing second on the podium to salvage only four points. It was partly down to driving a cautious race in which he could’ve challenged Vettel for the lead and by the second half of the season he was expected to bounce back.

However, with two races in Hamilton still has sizeable advantage over his teammate in both qualifying and race as evident from the former’s 11th pole of the season. Rosberg’s woes were compounded by the switch to older-spec engine ahead of qualifying. Coming into Monza, both Silver Arrows boasted new engines as the remaining seven development tokens were wholly spent on them.

The superiority of the new engines developed in conjunction with fuel supplier Petronas was obvious from the first practice on the power-thirsty Italian track. But ahead of qualifying, Rosberg was forced to revert to the engine introduced in Canada as a later investigation suggested that a coolant leak contaminated the newly-spec engine. Subsequently with five races under its belt already, Rosberg qualified fourth on the under-powered unit behind the Ferrari pair of Raikkonen and Vettel with three tenths adrift of team-mate Hamilton.

He had to negotiate round the near-stationary Raikkonen off the line and was down to sixth before recovering to undercut the Williams pair and move himself up to third. The remaining parts of his race was spent behind fellow German compatriot Vettel with a set of tyres seven laps older than the Ferrari ace. By the time only two seconds separated each other, Mercedes decided to up the engine power a bit with three laps to go. It proved too much as his engine expired at the second chicane with a cloud of smoke pouring out from the back. Rosberg conceded a huge chunk of points with the retirement as Hamilton now leads the championship by a commanding 53 points.

#3 Raikkonen returns to his best:

After the Friday practice sessions, Ferrari were not expected to be on par with the Mercedes duo but as the track dried and Hamilton still pulling out fastest laps, Vettel did give tifosi something to cheer about as he closed the gap to his main rival by less than three tenths on his final soft tyre run in FP3.

Nevertheless, it was the other Ferrari of Kimi Raikkonen who did a stonking lap in the final part of qualifying to register his first front row start since 2013 Chinese GP and first on his return to the fabled Italian marque. From second and third, the Ferraris set sights on leapfrogging Hamilton. While Vettel tucked behind the eventual winner, the 2007 world champion almost stalled on the grid as cars swooped around going past him.

As the cars approached Rettifilio chicane for the first time Raikkonen was down in last position. However, undeterred by the poor start he made up quick grounds as the frantic opening lap unfolded. He dispensed Fernando Alonso early on and set about catching the other penalty-incurred midfield runners. At lap four Carlos Sainz Jr., Jenson Button and Daniel Ricciardo fell victim to him as he stretched his soft tyre stint to 28 laps.

He was running as high as third before pitting for medium rubber and rejoined in tenth. Ferrari have used three tokens to bring forth an upgraded engine that paid dividends as he comfortably fended off the fight from his Renault-engined nemesis. In the final few laps, he dispossessed both Mercedes-powered Force India drivers who especially were very quick in straight line to come home a brilliant fifth after Rosberg retired of engine failure.

Raikkonen put his start misery down to the clutch set-up as he revealed that his car went into anti-stall mode after releasing first clutch that scuppered him from a possible podium. His recovery drive was impressive nonetheless boosted by the upgraded engine and of course recent renewal of his contract to stay put with Ferrari next year.

#4 F1 without Monza is a no-brainer:

The Italian Grand Prix at Monza is one of the few historic circuits along with Silverstone, Monaco, Spa and Budapest that still grace the F1 calendar. Monza was the home for Formula One in all but one year since its very inception back in 1950 and with Ecclestone focusing on signing contracts with modern venues, the fate of Monza remains unanswered. Steeped in rich tradition, the circuit’s contract is set to run out at the end of next year and no deal has been put in place yet to contest the race beyond 2016.

As F1 supremo Bernie Ecclestone stands resolute to offer Monza organizers no concession, the deal hasn’t borne fruit. It is understood that Ecclestone wants an annual hosting fee of €25 million which is almost half as much in contrast to what the organizers are willing to pay. Speaking of the current situation, Ecclestone said:

"This has been going on for two and a half years, and it's up to them to make up their mind,"

"The price we are asking for is the same as the other people in Europe are paying.”

Monza has an unique atmosphere to any other track on the calendar with tifosi flooding along the long straight during podium ceremonies is a sight to behold. With the last gasp effort to contest German GP at Nurburgring fell apart this year; F1 cannot afford to lose another monumental track like Monza. Echoing the concerns to retain the Italian GP beyond 2016 at the “Cathedral of Speed”, four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel addressed after his first home podium in Ferrari colours that,

“The emotions on the podium is incredible,”

“If we take this away from the calendar for any s**** money reasons I think you are basically ripping our hearts out,” he added. “We are here, we are racing and this makes it so much more worthwhile.”

“It’s what we’re here for. You stand on the grid, you look to the left, you look to the right, people are just happy to be part of it and it makes our day. So, simple as that. It’s incredible.”

#5 Massa - not old just yet:

With eight years at the helm of Ferrari, Felipe Massa has always been a popular figure in Italy. Clinching an euphoric third podium at Monza, the Brazilian driver was as ever well-received by the tifosi after managing to keep his Williams team-mate at bay in the closing laps.

Having outqualified the Finn on Saturday for a third row Williams lockout, Massa stayed ahead at the start as Bottas negotiated his way past Kimi Raikkonen’s temporarily stranded Ferrari. The race was a relatively straightforward one between them, as they didn’t quite have the pace to challenge the Mercedes duo and the Ferrari of Sebastian Vettel.

Despite being undercut by Nico Rosberg in the first round of pit stops, it was the nip and tuck battle race between the Williams pair that went on to the chequered flag. Having decided to pit ahead of schedule to try and prevent Rosberg from jumping in the pits, Massa was always going to be at a disadvantage when Bottas took his rubber later than his team-mate that gave him a better tyre performance and traction in the final laps.

Both drivers were reluctant to give in as Massa fended off the raging Williams of Bottas with comparatively less grip on his rear tyres. After the spectacular fourth podium with the grove-based team, the 2008 runner-up admitted it was one of the tough podium battles he had ever indulged in. The elated Brazilian acknowledged,

“It was very tough – I'm getting too old for that!” Massa joked.

“The last three laps of the race, I was fighting with my team-mate and it was very difficult, but we managed to be here and I am so happy. Woohoo!”