GPWizard F1 Forum
F1 News & Discussions => General F1 Discussion => Topic started by: J.Clark on August 29, 2016, 03:08:58 PM
-
One of three of the original circuits still on the calendar.
More later. Feel free to comment in the meantime.
-
Another one of my favourite tracks. Just a shame that hardly any engines ever fail any more. That always made Monza quite lively. Still, Rosberg may be concerned as his engine did fail there last year, and he has had better reliability than Hamilton up until now.
-
Alright, Monza is famous. What else can be said?
It is high speed, with 11 corners, and fairly straight forward. The fastest cars out of the corners will dominate easily. There are two DRS zones: one on the start/finish straight and the other on the run from turn 7 down to the 8, 9, 10 chicane. Overtaking will come down largely to which driver is the best at late braking. The circuit is 5.8 km, so fairly long, with a race distance of 53 laps covering just over 300 km.
The lap record was set by Rubens Barrichello back in 2004 in his Ferrari, at 1:21.046. I imagine with the vastly improve V6 this season, that record should fall.
Current drivers who have won at Monza:
Hamilton 3
Vettel 3
Alonso 2
I have two pictures of the track layout. The first is one I chose because it shows the oval, with the modern circuit as an overlay. In the old form, every other lap was done on the other circuit. A lap on the road course, and then the next lap would be on the oval.
-
Monza was built in 1922. It was the world's 3rd purpose built auto racing venue, after Brooklands & Indy. It's known as "La Pista Magica," The Magic Track. It is on the grounds of a former royal park.
The Tifosi will be out in force. Ferrari always put forth maximum effort at their home race. Still, I think the high speed nature of the track bodes well for Mercedes.
By the way, before it became a name for hard-core Ferrari fans, the word tifosi referred to people with typhus.
-
Chance of rain at Monza this weekend. A young boy won Monza in the rain in a crummy little Torro Rosso a bunch of years ago...I think his name was Vettel.
Monza in the rain can be a surprising and unforgiving place. :good: :good:
-
Chance of rain at Monza this weekend. A young boy won Monza in the rain in a crummy little Torro Rosso a bunch of years ago...I think his name was Vettel.
Monza in the rain can be a surprising and unforgiving place. :good: :good:
That was a great race to watch. I don't think the modern cars handle well enough in the rain, which has led to the disappearance of the 'rain meister' drivers.
-
In my top 3 tracks but I wonder if the reward is still on for Scott
and Ian?Just like Casablanca it was the beginning of a wonder friendship
-
The race I remember the most at Monza is the 1999 event when Hakkinen spun out of the lead, and ended up crying in the bushes. For sheer emotional drama only the 1988 race where Senna was taken out by Schlesser and Ferrari scored a one-two for the first race at Monza since Enzo Ferrari's death surpasses it in my view, and I didn't see that one live, hence why I favour the 1999 race.
-
The race I remember the most at Monza is the 1999 event when Hakkinen spun out of the lead, and ended up crying in the bushes. For sheer emotional drama only the 1988 race where Senna was taken out by Schlesser and Ferrari scored a one-two for the first race at Monza since Enzo Ferrari's death surpasses it in my view, and I didn't see that one live, hence why I favour the 1999 race.
Hakkinen was a special moment for me as an F1 fan. Until that point, I saw drivers as 'gods' who would get in the car and perform miracles. He pulled back the curtain, and helped me understand that these are people, people following their dreams, and caught up in a world that is so much more immense than themselves. My love for the sport grew deeper, because I realized how much love these drivers, mechanics and engineers put into every race weekend just so I could sit and watch.
They weren't gods, instead, they're something better: They're people who can perform miracles. And when the miracles fail to happen, when they've done everything humanly possible and come up short, they're just as human as I am.
His tears washed away the corporate logos, the engine formula, the tire wars, and showed why F1 is the pinnacle of motorsport.
-
Massa having announced his retirement seems to have helped him get back on terms with his teammate, as illustrated with his start a week ago at Spa, and his performance in this morning's practice 3.
1. Hamilton Mercedes 1m 22.008
2. Rosberg Mercedes 1m 22.401
3. Vettel Ferrari 1m 22.946
4. Raikkonen Ferrari 1m 23.149
5. Bottas Williams 1m 23.500
6. Massa Williams 1m 23.647
7. Ricciardo Red Bull 1m 23.709
8. Verstappen Red Bull 1m 23.740
9. Perez Force India 1m 23.917
10. Gutierrez Haas 1m 24.036
11. Hulkenberg Force India 1m 24.041
12. Button McLaren 1m 24.104
13. Sainz Toro Rosso 1m 24.240
14. Grosjean Haas 1m 24.463
15. Palmer Renault 1m 24.533
16. Ericsson Sauber 1m 24.542
17. Alonso McLaren 1m 24.658
18. Nasr Sauber 1m 24.715
19. Magnussen Renault 1m 24.793
20. Kvyat Toro Rosso 1m 24.845
21. Wehrlein MRT 1m 24.893
22. Ocon MRT 1m 24.938
What has happened to Kvyat?
-
The grid:
1. Lewis Hamilton GBR Mercedes-Mercedes 1m 21.135s
2. Nico Rosberg GER Mercedes-Mercedes 1m 21.613s
3. Sebastian Vettel GER Ferrari-Ferrari 1m 21.972s
4. Kimi Raikkonen FIN Ferrari-Ferrari 1m 22.065s
5. Valtteri Bottas FIN Williams-Mercedes 1m 22.388s
6. Daniel Ricciardo AUS Red Bull-TAG Heuer 1m 22.389s
7. Max Verstappen NED Red Bull-TAG Heuer 1m 22.411s
8. Sergio Perez MEX Force India-Mercedes 1m 22.814s
9. Nico Hulkenberg GER Force India-Mercedes 1m 22.836s
10. Esteban Gutierrez MEX Haas-Ferrari 1m 23.184s
11. Felipe Massa BRZ Williams-Mercedes 1m 22.967s
12. Romain Grosjean FRA Haas-Ferrari 1m 23.092s *
13. Fernando Alonso ESP McLaren-Honda 1m 23.273s
14. Pascal Wehrlein GER MRT-Mercedes 1m 23.315s
15. Jenson Button GBR McLaren-Honda 1m 23.399s
16. Carlos Sainz Jr ESP Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1m 23.496s
17. Daniil Kvyat RUS Toro Rosso-Ferrari 1m 23.825s
18. Felipe Nasr BRZ Sauber-Ferrari 1m 23.956s
19. Marcus Ericsson SWE Sauber-Ferrari 1m 24.087s
20. Jolyon Palmer GBR Renault-Renault 1m 24.230s
21. Kevin Magnussen DEN Renault-Renault 1m 24.436s
22. Esteban Ocon FRA MRT-Mercedes No time
* Grosjean will start P-17 for a transmission change I think.
Let us see, if the engine rules were not so easily circumvented, Hamilton would be starting from P-22 this race, and P-11 in Singapore.
Not any real surprises up front; although, one has to wonder what happened to Massa on his final hot lap in Q2, since he was within tenths of Bottas on all previous laps.
Vettel has to be resting a bit easier too, having out-qualified Kimi.
Ricciardo must be happy to be ahead of Max again.
Haas has proved themselves to be a genuine mid-field team right out of the box. It is good, very good, to have an American team on the grid, but even more so since they are competitive and scoring points.
-
A bit of a dull session in many ways. The only surprise was Gutierrez getting into the top ten. I did not see that coming. An excellent performance from him and Haas.
Hamilton's pace advantage over Rosberg was staggering, especially at a track where the lap times are usually very close. It's his race to lose tomorrow. Providing he gets a good start, only a technical failure can stop him.
I fear tomorrow's race will be a procession, unless there are any incidents at the chicanes on the first lap, so let's hope for an exciting start to the race to liven things up a bit.
-
Cheers to Gutierrez for getting Haas their first Q3. Sadly, Grosjean will get a 5 place grid penalty for a gearbox swap.
I think Williams could have a good day on this low downforce track. I expect the Mercedes to run away and hide, but I hope for some close racing between Williams, Ferrari & RBR.
-
If Vettel gets one of his super starts, could be interesting.
-
What a snorefest that was.
By the first corner half the field had blown their starts and mucked up everyone's picks. I've never seen so many yellow and green triangles on the lineup showing who gained and lost places. The best battles were at the back of the field. Button must have been so chuffed to blow past Alonso, but I can't believe Alonso wasn't fighting some issue or another to let Button get that close and then have Gutierrez go by as well (I think Button had newer rubber at the time as well). Sorry to see Wehrlein have bad luck after a decent weekend. I will be interested to see how he fairs in a faster car in a season or two.
The top 10 seem to be the usual suspects, though not quite in the order we might have expected. Disappointed in Kimi for letting Vettel by on the start. I was hoping Though I don't think the top two would not be Mercs at Monza because Monza is a track where if you have good straight line speed, you will automatically dominate. Nice to see both Force Indias in the points again.
I don't think I have ever picked the 5th, 6th and 7th cars ever before, which saved me from having a horrible GG result. For some reason I thought I had 4 DNF's, but I guess I changed it this morning. Great results for Greener and Luke - holy crap guys, bet you wish you doubled up. And not too bad for the guy who did - 24 ain't too shabby Philbe.
The standings are sure tightening up. Only two points between Hamilton and Rosberg (starting to think it is scripted to get more Merc TV time). Glad to see Ricciardo increasing his lead over Verstappen. Gotta keep that young whippersnapper down. At least (as far as I know) there were no more Trump-like statements from Max after the race. He couldn't really complain about anyone today, and maybe he'll have a chance to watch the race and see the number of other high speed passes that took place along DRS zones that didn't have the car being passed suddenly veer over and almost cause a crash...because there were more than a few. Vettel and Raikkonen only 7 points apart. Still time for a good result or two from Kimi and a bad one or two from Vettel to secure Ferrari confidence in Kimi. Big applause for Williams getting back ahead of Force India in the Constructors. They will have to guard it carefully from Hulk and Checko though...
-
All in all, not a bad race, but not too exciting either.
I was quite happy to Lewis bungle his start again and end up 6th, if only briefly.
Like Scott, I wish Kimi had gotten Vettel at the start, but . . . They each had a pretty good race and probably the best the team could have done.
Williams did well, with both drivers having awesome starts. Having both cars finishing in the points again had to be a feel good moment.
It was a bit disappointed, or perhaps I am mistaken, but did the stewards penalize a Sauber for causing an accident with a Renault? I watched it in replay a few times and saw no foul there.
-
On Channel 4 the boys couldn't see the point of the penalty since both cars were eventually retired as a result, and in fact Sauber pushed the car out to the pit box to serve the penalty and then back into the garage so they wouldn't get docked grid places next race (what?).
-
"not a bad race"!!!! It was terrible. I literally fell asleep in the middle of it. The only way it could have offered some excitement was if Hamilton's clutch problem had only caused him to drop directly behind Rosberg so we could have seen him trying to pass or if both Mercedes' had suffered the same clutch problem so they dropped back in the pack and we might have seen some brief racing until they overtook everyone and disappeared into the distance. I love Monza but while the Mercedes are so dominant it offers no spectacle!
-
"Clutch trouble" translation. I blew my start but am too stubborn to admit it.
-
"Clutch trouble" translation. I blew my start but am too stubborn to admit it.
I heard on the radio this morning that Hamilton initially took the blame but after analysis it was subsequently diagnosed as a clutch problem.
I haven't had a chance to look for any 'official' response from Mercedes.
-
That was all pretty dull after the first few laps, sadly.
I remarked that it was Hamilton's race to lose and lose it he did. That's possibly the worst start from pole I've seen since Villeneuve at Suzuka in 1996. If Hamilton does go on to lose to Rosberg in the championship, poor starts will be the reason. He has lost around four races this year because of failing to get off the line quickly enough.
Button pulled a good move on Alonso, and there was some racing early on when drivers were on different strategies, but from about lap 20 onwards I lost interest. It really was a bit of a parade.