Chloe Reynolds
On Sunday 1st September, at Ferrari’s home in Monza, Italy, Charles Leclerc pulled off an incredible win ahead of Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris at the Italian Grand Prix.
Qualifying
Ferrari chose to have a bold one-stop strategy for Leclerc to hold onto the lead, thrilling the Tifosi.
After making a strong start from pole position, Norris was overtaken fairly quickly after Piastri swept past into the lead.
The majority of the cars decided on a two-stop strategy, but Ferrari decided to go for the one-stop for both Leclerc and Carlos Sainz.
The risk did not pay off for Sainz, whose birthday also happened to fall on race day. His ageing tyres slowed him down and both of the McLarens managed to overtake, moving into second and third. Leclerc held out to grab the win for Ferrari, crossing 2.6s ahead of Piastri.
It was Norris who claimed the extra point for setting the fastest lap as the pole starter had to eventually settle for third.
There were three varied practice sessions before an impeccably close qualifying, which saw a front-row lock-out for McLaren. The weather conditions for the weekend were hot and sunny, the conditions to be expected for a summer in Italy, although thunderstorms were also on the cards.
The Race
Having made a slow start last time at Zandvoort, Norris was determined to make sure that this would not be the case in Monza. He kept the lead in turn 1, but George Russell locked up from third after trying to avoid Piastri. This forced him to drop down in the positions.
— Scuderia Ferrari HP (@ScuderiaFerrari) September 4, 2024
Not even a few moments later Piastri moved ahead of Norris and into first position. Leclerc took advantage of this to move up a position with Norris dropping down into P3, and Russell was down to P7 with damage to his front wing.
The stewards had noted Nico Hulkenberg and Daniel Ricciardo for an incident at the very start of the race where the two had made contact.
Piastri was leading the Ferrari of Leclerc by just under one second coming to the end of Lap 8, with Norris still trying to catch up from two seconds behind, Yuki Tsunoda had to retire from the race following a contact with Hulkenberg.
Hulkenberg was not having a good afternoon as he was then dealt another blow as he received a ten-second penalty for causing the incident with Tsunoda. It was at this point Sergio Perez had overtaken Russell for seventh, the Mercedes driver had to pit to get a new front wing, which made him fall down to P16.
“Leclerc to hold onto the lead, thrilling the Tifosi”
Norris was still trying to catch up to Leclerc whilst Piastri was still in the lead. He pitted to get some hard tyres and emerged back on track in eighth place.
Leclerc made his pitstop and found himself behind Norris. This meant the P1 and P2 then went to the Red Bulls of Max Verstappen and Perez with the pair yet to make a stop.
The work continued for the stewards with an incident between Kevin Magnussen and Pierre Gasly, Magnussen had tried to move down the inside before locking up resulting in contact between the two cars.
On his debut race for Williams, Franco Colpinto was in 15th and proving himself well. At the front of the race the red Ferrari of Leclerc was getting close to the orange McLaren of Piastri.
With only ten laps remaining, Leclerc was the race leader and had an 11-second advantage over teammate Sainz. Verstappen was on fresh tyres and getting close to Lewis Hamilton, currently in fifth.
The tension rose for Ferrari as they clung on to the lead in their home race. Piastri tried to cut into Leclerc’s lead but he didn’t do enough to close the gap. This meant Leclerc managed to hold on and take the Italian Grand Prix win on home soil.
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Featured image courtesy of Random Winner via Pixabay No changes have been made to this image. Image license found here.
