Italian GP : Qualification.

Mercedes F1 team carries its domination over the times at the Italian GP. It had 1,2’s in all the sessions, including the qualifications’ session. The best time, and pole position were Hamilton‘s, dominant in all the qualifying session (Q1, Q2 & Q3). He did a flying last lap, beating all drivers to the pole, with a 1:21.135, leading his team mate by almost half a second.

Hamilton has the pole, yet, he will start with potentially flat-spotted tires, Mercedes will ask to change them, they may present danger on the driver himself and on the race. Ferrari locked the second row in the starting grid, Vettel (1:21.972) beat Raikkonen (1:22.065) for the third place, and the drivers will start on softer, faster tires, but will have shorter first stints. Vettel may have his 3rd place revoked, because he may have gone off track in the parabolica curve. Velteri Bottas was 5th, and Ricciardo 6th. Verstappen who was criticized for his driving style, by the race director Charlie Whiting, the F1 drivers, and even the GP2 drivers, did only achieve 7th place on the grid doing a 1:22.411. Haas, who put a driver in Q3 for the first time ever, had only the 10th position, Gutierrez had it, Grosjean will be having a 5-places grid penalty for changing his gearbox.

Esteban Ocon, who had electronic problems in the free practice on Friday, did not score a time today, and will start last, still not clear, if from the grid, or from the pits. His team mate, Pascal Wehrlein scored the 14th time, but will start from the 13th spot on the grid, due to Grosjean’s Penalty.

Both Force India drivers are behind William’s driver, Bottas, 5th on the grid. Sergio Perez was 8th and Hulkenberg 9th. To everyone big surprise Massa was out of Q2. He said that he did not get the grip he needed from his tires.

Mclaren will be having a quite difficult race with both drivers out of qualifying in Q2.

This is the provisional grid for tomorrow :

Italian GP in Monza : Free practice sessions.

After the dramatic F1 Belgian Gp, we head to the Italian GP, in Monza (or God’s personal race track). The two free practice sessions were largely dominated by Mercedes team, and Ferrari in the run. Mercedes had 1,2 for Rosberg first Hamilton, Ferrari 3rd, 4th, in favor to Raikkonen. In FP2, there was the same result for constructors except drivers exchanging places. Red Bull was a bit far in the ranks.

The two marking events of the day, were the return of Kevin Magnussen, after being cleared to drive, and Charlie Whiting, having “the talk” with the young Max Verstappen. The young Dutchman was criticized for his aggressive defense against Raikkonen, which was the theme of drivers debrief. Charlie Whiting gave the teenager a soft warning, telling him that what he did could have lead him to disqualification. Of course being a teenager, and being criticized by many of his colleagues, Verstappen prefers not to care, as Horner says.

The first free practice session was dominated by Mercedes F1 team, Roseberg scored 1:22.959, right behind him, was Lewis Hamilton, 2 tenths separating him from the lead. Ferrari was 3rd and 4th, advantage to Raikkonen. Ferrari is doing great results, and closing to Mercedes thanks to new upgrades on the power plant. New elements including a new internal combustion engine, new turbochargers, new MGU-H, new control electronics, and a anew energy store were used for the Italian GP, and with this Ferrari has used all of its 32 tokens of development. Next time Ferrari will bring an update, it may risk the penalty. In FP1 Raikkonen did a 1:24.074 and Vettel did 1:24.307 which is a bit more than a second away from Rosberg’s time. In FP2, Ferrari closed the gap to the lead. to just 4 tenths for Vettel and 6 tenths for Raikkonen.

Haas did benefit from Ferrari new power unit, with less changes, the results were impressive, 6th place for Grosjean, 1,804 off the lead and 9th for Gutierrez, 2 seconds off. The results for the FP2 were not as good, but the team is confident that the results tomorrow will be better. Force India’s Perez kept with the 5th place, done with super soft tires. Force India ran with three drivers : Perez (5th in FP1, 13th in FP2), Alfonso Celis (who is Force India’s reserve driver, who did an impressive 1éth position) and Nico Hulkenberg who ended the FP2 being 12th.

One other remarkable result, is this of McLaren–Honda. Even with difficulties for Alonso wit the gear box and the clutch, he finished in the top ten for the FP2, being a second and a half off the lead. Button looks forward to being a fourth time in Q3 tomorrow.

Massa, after announcing retirement at the end of this season, had his fair share of difficulties, with a boost problem in his Mercedes power unit. He could only achieve 14th and 11th place today. Ocon had a problem with his car which engendered a virtual safety car call.

Results of the two sessions are as below :

PRACTICE ONE TIMES:

Pos	Driver	Car	Time	Gap	Laps
1	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1m22.959s	–	37
2	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1m23.162s	0.203s	36
3	Kimi Raikkonen	Ferrari	1m24.047s	1.088s	16
4	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	1m24.307s	1.348s	17
5	Sergio Perez	Force India/Mercedes	1m24.650s	1.691s	32
6	Romain Grosjean	Haas/Ferrari	1m24.763s	1.804s	17
7	Valtteri Bottas	Williams/Mercedes	1m24.785s	1.826s	37
8	Max Verstappen	Red Bull/Renault	1m24.982s	2.023s	25
9	Esteban Gutierrez	Haas/Ferrari	1m25.113s	2.154s	19
10	Daniel Ricciardo	Red Bull/Renault	1m25.120s	2.161s	17
11	Jenson Button	McLaren/Honda	1m25.351s	2.392s	23
12	Alfonso Celis	Force India/Mercedes	1m25.367s	2.408s	30
13	Fernando Alonso	McLaren/Honda	1m25.507s	2.548s	14
14	Felipe Massa	Williams/Mercedes	1m25.840s	2.881s	18
15	Marcus Ericsson	Sauber/Ferrari	1m25.853s	2.894s	20
16	Carlos Sainz	Toro Rosso/Ferrari	1m25.973s	3.014s	20
17	Daniil Kvyat	Toro Rosso/Ferrari	1m26.074s	3.115s	20
18	Esteban Ocon	Manor/Mercedes	1m26.391s	3.432s	30
19	Felipe Nasr	Sauber/Ferrari	1m26.439s	3.480s	21
20	Pascal Wehrlein	Manor/Mercedes	1m26.762s	3.803s	28
21	Jolyon Palmer	Renault	1m26.811s	3.852s	35
22	Kevin Magnussen	Renault	1m26.956s	3.997s	32

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Practice Two timesheet
1. Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes, 1:22.801
2. Nico Rosberg, Mercedes, + 0.193
3. Sebastian Vettel, Ferrari, + 0.453
4. Kimi Raikkonen, Ferrari, + 0.626
5. Max Verstappen, Red Bull, + 0.931
6. Daniel Ricciardo, Red Bull, + 1.202
7. Fernando Alonso, McLaren, 1.458
8. Valtteri Bottas, Williams, + 1.498
9. Romain Grosjean, Haas, + 1.715
10. Jenson Button, McLaren, + 1.748
11. Felipe Massa, Williams, + 1.755
12. Nico Hulkenberg, Force India, + 1.786
13. Sergio Perez, Force India, + 1.852
14. Esteban Gutierrez, Haas, + 1.873
15. Marcus Ericsson, Sauber, + 2.180
16. Pascal Wehrlein, Manor, + 2.282
17. Carlos Sainz, Toro Rosso, + 2.439
18. Esteban Ocon, Manor, +2.474
19. Kevin Magnussen, Renault, + 2.754
20. Daniil Kvyat, Toro Rosso, + 2.813
21. Felipe Nasr, Sauber, + 2.842
22. Jolyon Palmer, Renault, + 3.032