Max Verstappen took the Italian GP and the winning record
Max Verstappen won the Italian GP after a fierce battle with Carlos Sainz and as well, broke the record for more consecutive wins.
Qualifying
Qualifying was very similar to what we were seeing in all the practice runs. Ferrari had a very strong straight speed, while Red Bull was stronger on the curves.
Q1
Liam Lawson passed Q1 for the first time in his F1 career this being his second race. He is substituting for Daniel Ricciardo who is currently injured. The rookie is currently showing he has the power to join Formula 1 in upcoming seasons. As well, both Alpine drivers got eliminated in Q1 for the first time in the history of their factory.
Q2
Q2 was very calm and normal. All the big names that were expected to pass got into Q3. One surprise was Alex Albon who managed to pass once again to Q3.
Q3
However, Q3 was a whole different story in comparison to Q2. The times in Q3 were constantly changing with drivers like Max Verstappen, Charles Leclerc, Carlos Sainz, Sergio Perez, and others improving in almost every lap they made.
In the last lap, with the clock on 0:00, Leclerc went over the line and positioned himself in pole position. However, it didn’t last very long since Verstappen passed the finish line to take it away. Then came Sainz who used every oz of speed the car had and ended Max’s pole-sitting streak.
Race day
The race day was her and the Tifosi made sure everyone knew. With the stance colored in red the cars went into their starting positions. The lights turned green and the formation lap was on its way. However, just as Yuki Tsunoda was finishing the lap he suffered an engine failure that forced him to leave the race earlier. Thanks to this the drivers had to make two other formation laps before the race started.
After the unorthodox start, the race was about to begin. Carlos Sainz knew he was going to have a difficult task trying to keep Max Verstappen behind him. The race started and both drivers had excellent starts. This helped Sainz maintain his position.
Carlos showed great defensive skills managing to retain Max for a good amount of laps. Nevertheless, it was almost impossible for Sainz to keep defending perfectly as he was doing, and with the help of DRS Verstappen overtook him on lap 15.
The degradation started to affect the two Ferraris that now sat in P2 and P3. Their pace was significantly slower than most of the other cars. Even with this, the team decided to leave both cars on the track a while longer. Thanks to this, Sergio Perez, who had already overtaken George Russell, got closer to them.
When they finally decided to make the pitstop with Sainz, Verstappen did the same and the story repeated itself with Chakres and Perez. Despite that, it was too late and Verstappen was able to maintain the lead and Perez ended right behind Leclerc.
It didn’t take Sergio Perez many laps to overtake Charles Leclerc. However, the next Ferrari wasn’t going to be that easy to pass. Carlos Sainz defended just as well as he did with Max Verstappen. But just as it happened with Max, Checo found an opening and moved to P2 with only a few laps left.
When everyone thought the race action in the front was over, Leclerc started pushing Carlos to the limits attempting to overtake him. Instead of stopping him, the team decided to let them fight, an unusual reaction by the team. Was it because Leclerc was the one behind?
In the end, Carlos Sainz maintained that P3 and got the podium position.
With this victory, Red Bull now has 15 consecutive race wins and Max Verstappen 10.
What are your opinions regarding that battle between the two Ferraris right at the end?
