Championship leader Max Verstappen produced another superb recovery charge to overcome a grid penalty and jump Charles Leclerc to deny Ferrari a home victory at Monza.
Polesitter Leclerc defied expectation by running a two-stop strategy but his late push on fresh tyres failed to produce enough pace to reel in the defending champion as Verstappen rose from seventh position.
Leclerc had his hopes bolstered by a late safety car that had the potential to throw a spanner in the works, but it was slow to pick up the leaders and duly denied a thrilling sprint to the finish and denied any Ferrari comeback.
That allowed the Red Bull Racing driver to claim his 31st victory, fifth in a row and eleventh of the season to close to within two triumphs of the record for the most successful Formula 1 season.
After a change of internal combustion engine on the advice of supplier Honda, Verstappen lined up seventh thanks to a five-place grid penalty following his lap for second in qualifying.
His RB18 was shod in the softest available C4 tyre to launch well and claim fifth swiftly following an anti-stall trigger for third-starting Lando Norris and a pass on Fernando Alonso.
Verstappen kept climbing in the early stages of the 53-lap 100th anniversary race at Monza. He relegated AlphaTauri pilot Pierre Gasly for fourth at the end of lap one before diving past 2021 Italian Grand Prix winner Daniel Ricciardo under braking into the first chicane for a provisional podium.
That left only Leclerc and second-starting George Russell up ahead, the Mercedes holding firm after aborting the first chicane while squabbling with the Ferrari for the early lead.
Despite the W13 separating the pair, Leclerc and Verstappen traded early fastest laps over the timing line as a net 2.5 seconds split the protagonists.
Then the Red Bull claimed second with a great run out of Ascari before combining DRS and the tow to pass Russell cleanly down the main straight to tee up the fight for the win.
With Verstappen a couple of tenths faster per lap, Ferrari attempted to twist by using a virtual safety car – called when Sebastian Vettel parked up with a smoky engine – to give Leclerc a cheaper pitstop.
He stopped for a set of mediums on lap 13 with a swift 2.2 seconds service just as the green flags were waved to dent the effectiveness of the undercut and Leclerc was released in third with 18 seconds to find.
Despite his aging softs, Verstappen was able to hold a decent pace – lapping only 0.5 seconds slower than Leclerc while holding a 10.2 seconds cushion to Russell as Leclerc trailed by a further 4.1 seconds.
As the F1-75 began to make gains, Verstappen pitted for mediums on lap 26 and courtesy of a quick 2.4 seconds stop, came out only a touch over 10 seconds adrift of the leader.
Verstappen’s fresh rubber enabled him to close the gap to 5.4 seconds when Ferrari called Leclerc in again on lap 34 for softs seemingly for a straightforward run to flag, the Red Bull returning in second over Russell.
Leclerc’s initial pace was subdued but he managed to turn up the wick to lap 0.4 seconds faster than Verstappen as the gap stood at 18 seconds with ten laps to go.
But a spanner was thrown in the works on lap 47 when Ricciardo parked up out of Ascari with an engine failure to trigger a safety car, which was deployed late but Verstappen pitted next time around for new softs and Leclerc swapped to used C4s along with Russell in third.
With the field well spread out, the safety car picking up Russell instead and then the lapped cars of Valtteri Bottas and Yuki Tsunoda splitting the lead duo, plus the McLaren taking time to be cleared by the crane, the race was not restarted to deny a sprint to the flag.
As such, Verstappen secured the win over Leclerc as Russell completed the podium, while Carlos Sainz turned in a rapid first-stint ascension to offset his back of the grid penalty and snare fourth.
Lewis Hamilton did similar, notably holding onto his Mercedes while chasing Alonso plus performing a slick double pass on Norris and Gasly to bag seventh position.
Sergio Perez was able to make the flag despite a persistent brake fire at his first stop for hard tyres, as Norris claimed seventh over Gasly.
Formula E champion Nyck de Vries equalled Williams’ best result of the season in ninth to cap off his fine substitute appearance for an appendicitis-side-lined Alex Albon.
This was an impressive drive by De Vries, subbing at late notice and delivering by finishing in the points with P9.
Zhou Guanyu, meanwhile, completed the top ten for Alfa Romeo ahead of Esteban Ocon and Mick Schumacher.
Behind Bottas and Tsunoda, Nicholas Latifi and Kevin Magnussen (picking up a 5 seconds penalty for aborting the first chicane) completed the runners.
Alongside Ricciardo and Vettel, Lance Stroll and Alonso (suspected water pump failure) were forced to pull up early.
So congratulations to Max Verstappen. After a triple header of races at Spa, Zandvoort and Monza, the Red Bull driver has won it all and is heading towards his second championship title thanks to the big haul of points. Well deserved.
Italian Grand Prix, Monza:
1 Max Verstappen Red Bull 1:20:27.511
2 Charles Leclerc Ferrari +2.446
3 George Russell Mercedes +3.405
4 Carlos Sainz Ferrari +5.061
5 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes +5.380
6 Sergio Perez Red Bull +6.091
7 Lando Norris McLaren +6.207
8 Pierre Gasly AlphaTauri +6.396
9 Nyck de Vries Williams +7.122s
10 Zhou Guanyu Alfa Romeo +7.910s
11 Esteban Ocon Alpine +8.323s
12 Mick Schumacher Haas +8.549s
13 Valtteri Bottas Alfa Romeo +1 lap
14 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri +1 lap
15 Nicholas Latifi Williams +1 lap
16 Kevin Magnussen Haas +1 lap
– Daniel Ricciardo McLaren DNF
– Lance Stroll Aston Martin DNF
– Fernando Alonso Alpine DNF
– Sebastian Vettel Aston Martin DNF
Italian Grand Prix race review as reported by Formula1.com.
Max Verstappen won the 2022 Italian Grand Prix under the Safety Car, with pole-sitter Charles Leclerc finishing runner-up as Red Bull denied Ferrari a home victory at Monza.
After the paddock paid their respects to the late Queen Elizabeth II, the mixed-up grid lined up behind Leclerc and fellow front-row starter George Russell in the Mercedes, both eschewing the general consensus of medium tyres to begin on new softs along with Verstappen, Williams’ debutant Nyck de Vries, and Alpine’s Esteban Ocon.
From P7 on the grid, Verstappen made it into the top three by Lap 4 and took P2 off Russell a lap later. The Dutchman then led as, during a Virtual Safety Car (for Sebastian Vettel’s DNF on Lap 12), Leclerc pitted from softs to mediums.
Verstappen extended his first stint and swapped for mediums on Lap 26, relinquishing the lead back to Leclerc, who then pitted a second time for soft tyres on Lap 33. The Monegasque driver had a tyre advantage over Verstappen, but a 20-second deficit to claw back by Lap 53. The Dutchman seemed assured of a comfortable victory until a Safety Car on Lap 48, for the stationary McLaren of Daniel Ricciardo. That allowed the top five to pit for softs anticipating a restart.
Ricciardo’s car seemed immovable, however, and the ticker reached Lap 53 and the chequered flag with the field behind the Safety Car – giving Verstappen a slim but altogether comfortable victory over Leclerc and allowing Russell to retain the final podium place.
From P18, Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz made it to the podium spots with a lengthy first stint on medium tyres, but fell to P4 after pitting, and ended up behind Russell. Lewis Hamilton declined to pit under the late Safety Car and finished fifth for Mercedes ahead of the second Red Bull of Sergio Perez, who pitted early for hard tyres and ended up settling for sixth and fastest lap, having started 13th.
Lando Norris finished seventh for McLaren, having started on the second row, with Pierre Gasly taking eighth for AlphaTauri. That left Williams’ Nyck de Vries ninth for Williams on his first-ever Grand Prix appearance, the Dutchman also taking Driver of the Day honours.
Rounding out the top 10 was Alfa Romeo’s Zhou Guanyu, with Ocon missing out on points. Mick Schumacher made late gains for P12 for Haas ahead of Valtteri Bottas in the Alfa Romeo, with Yuki Tsunoda finishing 14th having pitted under caution in the AlphaTauri. Nicholas Latifi lagged on hard tyres and finished 15th for Williams ahead of Kevin Magnussen, who picked up a five-second penalty for leaving the track and gaining an advantage on Lap 1 in the Haas.
Ricciardo retired late on to bring out the Safety Car, while both Aston Martins – Lance Stroll and Sebastian Vettel – failed to finish the race with suspected power unit issues. Fernando Alonso also retired, ending a run of points scores for the Alpine driver.
The 2022 Italian Grand Prix began with a solemn moment of silence to mark the passing of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, drivers and team members lining up in the pit lane to pay their respects.
After that moment of reflection, it was time for the mixed-up field to find its way to the grid, a number of grid penalties having shaken up the order post-qualifying. Charles Leclerc would start on pole ahead of George Russell, with the McLarens on the second row and Max Verstappen starting from seventh.
With Nyck de Vries promoted to P8 on the grid for his F1 debut (in place of an unwell Alex Albon), Sergio Perez and Esteban Ocon would start from 13th and 14th, while Carlos Sainz dropped to P18, Lewis Hamilton P19, and Yuki Tsunoda to the very back.
Sun beaming down on the Temple of Speed, it was time for the 2022 Italian Grand Prix – 100 years after Monza was constructed. Five drivers – Leclerc, Russell, Verstappen, de Vries, and Ocon – would begin on brand-new soft tyres with the rest on mediums.
Lights out, and it was Russell who enjoyed the best launch, attempting to move around the outside of Leclerc into Turn 1 but avoiding disaster with an excursion over the rumble strips to rejoin in second. Verstappen made up three places, meanwhile, as Lando Norris had fallen to seventh before retaking a place off Fernando Alonso.
Hamilton’s start wasn’t ideal, the Briton going through the escape road at Turn 1 to avoid a potential collision; Kevin Magnussen and Valtteri Bottas making slight contact at the start.
As Lap 2 began, Verstappen was up into the podium places at the expense of Daniel Ricciardo, going late on the brakes into the opening chicane. Behind, the used-medium-shod Aston Martins went wheel to wheel battling for P10 and Sainz and Perez jostled in the fight for P15. Sainz would soon clear Perez and the Haas of Magnussen for P13 by Lap 4, when Verstappen was bearing down on the rear wing of Russell for P2.
The Red Bull driver duly made the pass at the start of Lap 5, Verstappen well clear of Russell going into the first chicane. With Leclerc 2.1 seconds ahead in the lead, the 2022 champion-elect enjoyed the start he wanted at Monza, his team mate down in P14.
Sainz made swift work of moving into the top 10, making it into the points at the expense of Aston Martin’s Stroll at the start of Lap 6, while Perez had made it up to P13 in front of Ocon. In the midfield, a DRS train had formed from Ricciardo in P4 to Sainz in P10.
Verstappen began to recharge his batteries in order to mount a challenge for the lead, and Perez entered the pits to swap his mediums for hards on Lap 8 – brake smoke flickering out of his right-front tyre, and then a brief spit of flames. Perez was told to move his brake bias rearwards to cool his discs and Sainz meanwhile continued his recovery from P18, prying places off Zhou Guanyu and de Vries for P8 on Lap 9, then P7 off Alonso on Lap 10 to a huge roar from the crowd.
Former team mate Norris was another easy pass for Sainz and just as Lap 12 began, he pried P5 off Pierre Gasly – just before the Virtual Safety Car was deployed to recover the stationary Aston Martin of Sebastian Vettel, who had pulled to the side on the run to Ascari with a loss of power. It was a DNF for the four-time champion, at the circuit on which he clinched his very-first Grand Prix victory back in 2008.
The pit lane was abuzz with a swarm of yellow-clad mechanics, Leclerc agreeing with his pit wall that a stop for mediums was the right choice – the stop executed just before the VSC was rescinded. The Monegasque emerged third, holding on ahead of Ricciardo with Verstappen now leading over Russell. The Dutchman was told that it would be a tough ask for Leclerc to continue with mediums until the end of Lap 53.
Sainz declined to pit during the VSC, and took P4 off Ricciardo soon after Leclerc’s pit stop. Gasly attempted to follow suit with a pass on Ricciardo but had to skip through Turn 1 and give the place back. “Ricciardo is all over the place,” exclaimed the AlphaTauri driver.
A familiar feeling of consternation emerged from the Ferrari pit wall as they told Leclerc not to short-shift on the exit of corners, the pole-sitter responding to say that he couldn’t do such a thing – imploring his team to make sure the engine didn’t fail on him.
While Verstappen extended his advantage over Russell to seven seconds, Alonso and Norris battled as the McLaren driver had run wide and relinquished P7 to the Alpine. The Briton easily retook the place from the Spaniard, while de Vries stalked the cars in the hopes of taking points on his debut – a black-and-white flag for exceeding track limits the only blot on his copybook so far.
Gasly then opened the pit window on Lap 19, pitting for hards, and followed by Zhou and Stroll. Ricciardo, de Vries, Ocon, and Tsunoda responded a lap later – and thanks to a slow stop, the undercut had not paid off for Gasly, who was 13th behind Ricciardo after that flurry of tyre changes. As for Sainz, he was losing time on his starting set of mediums and now pleading with the pit wall to let him change tyres.
The Spaniard’s recovery had gone smoothly so far, but in P4 – 28 seconds off Verstappen – Sainz was now a pit stop’s distance away from the lead, while Perez was making gains after his early stop for hards having made it up to P9 and making quick work of the yet-to-stop midfielders around him.
Russell took the chance to pit for hards on Lap 24, a slightly slow stop seeing him emerge behind Sainz – but crucially in P4 ahead of Norris. Hamilton was meanwhile gaining on Alonso for P6, with Perez a few seconds back.
With Verstappen’s lead growing past 13 seconds, he pitted on Lap 26 and emerged in second on medium tyres, putting the onus on Leclerc – who, while 10 seconds up the road with half the race remaining, was on medium tyres that shouldered a significant burden.
Hamilton finally made the move on Alonso for P6 on lap 27.
Russell wasn’t thrilled with the pace of his hard tyres, but the Mercedes driver was still gaining around eight-tenths per lap on the medium-shod Ferrari of Sainz ahead and matching Leclerc, who in turn was losing time to Verstappen with the lap ticker reaching 30 of 53.
The lead over Russell amounting to just 1.8s, Sainz pitted for softs on Lap 31 and emerged in P8 behind hard-tyred Perez.
One lap later, Alonso pulled into the pits with a power unit issue and the Alpine driver’s race was over. With Ocon running 14th and both McLarens in the points, the battle for P4 in the constructors’ championship was turning away from Alpine.
The lead then changed hands again as Leclerc pitted for softs to emerge 20 seconds behind Verstappen – and 2.5s ahead of Russell – on Lap 34, just after Sainz had passed Perez for P6 into Turn 4.
Hamilton followed suit, choosing to pit from P7 to emerge on softs in P12 – with a DRS-endowed train of cars to pass for a points finish.
Hamilton made quick work of Zhou for P11, then de Vries for P10, with Norris responding and stopping on Lap 36. The McLaren driver emerged behind Ricciardo, but Hamilton breezed past – passing not only Norris but Gasly too – to take P7.
The other McLaren of Ricciardo was easily dealt with too, Hamilton making it up to P6 on Lap 38 as the soft tyres showed their worth – with Norris overtaking hard-shod team mate Ricciardo for P7 in chase of the Mercedes.
Lap 41 saw Lance Stroll come into the pits to end his run of finishes in every race this season and cap off a double retirement for Aston Martin.
With 10 laps remaining, Perez was pulled into the pits to swap his hard compounds for softs, as Hamilton was catching up in the hope to pry P5 off the Red Bull. The Mexican lost track position not only to Hamilton, but also Norris, as he emerged seventh.
Verstappen’s lead looked assured; he was 17 seconds ahead of Leclerc with 10 laps left, while Sainz was 10 seconds behind Russell in the chase for the final podium spot.
In lapping the backmarkers, Verstappen inadvertently helped out his compatriot de Vries, who was attempting to hold off Zhou in the place for the final point and – as blue flags flew – the Williams driver managed to break out of DRS range of the Alfa Romeo, and get within DRS range of the AlphaTauri of Gasly ahead.
Hopes of a huge margin of victory for Verstappen were however dashed when Daniel Ricciardo came to a halt ahead of the second Lesmo on Lap 47, triggering the Safety Car and allowing the top four to stop for soft tyres (Sainz taking new softs while Verstappen, Leclerc and Russell had to take scrubbed softs) in anticipation of a restart.
However, the field only lined up behind the Safety Car on Lap 51 of 53, a number of lapped cars mixing it up with those on the lead lap, and it soon became clear that this race would end under caution. With that, Verstappen took the chequered flag with a slim lead over Leclerc, but in reality the Dutchman seemed on course for his first-ever Italian Grand Prix win after the pit stops had taken their course.
Leclerc was furious that the race didn’t restart, and the fans weren’t particularly happy either, but Ferrari were set to be beaten on pace. The Monegasque settled for P2, with Russell ending up third ahead of Sainz in P4.
Hamilton couldn’t get a free pit stop under the Safety Car and thus stayed out, finishing fifth ahead of Perez – whose gamble to pit early in the race for hard tyres did not yield a podium finish.
Norris ended up seventh having pitted under that late caution, with Gasly’s one-stop strategy from mediums to hards seeing him finish eighth.
De Vries was voted Driver of the Day for taking P9 on his maiden F1 appearance as he did an admirable job filling in for Alex Albon. The Dutchman’s medium tyres were suffering towards the end of the race and that was clear when he battled with 10th-place Zhou just before the Safety Car emerged.
Ocon couldn’t make waves on his soft-hard strategy and Alpine ended up leaving Monza without points. Mick Schumacher made an impressive late pass on Nicholas Latifi and finished 12th at the flag ahead of Valtteri Bottas, with back-of-grid starter Yuki Tsunoda ending the race in P14.
Latifi struggled to P15 and finished ahead of Magnussen, who took a five-second penalty for leaving the track and gaining an advantage on Lap 1 and finished 16th.
With his first podium and victory at Monza, Verstappen heads to Singapore knowing he can mathematically clinch his second drivers’ title there.
Christian Horner commented that there was “more than enough time” to restart red-flagged Formula 1 Italian Grand Prix. Motorsport.com has the news story.
Red Bull team principal Christian Horner reckoned there was enough time to get Formula 1’s Italian Grand Prix restarted again, after it ended under the safety car.
Although the safety car brought out for Daniel Ricciardo’s stranded McLaren cemented Max Verstappen’s 11th victory of the season, Horner was adamant that it was not the manner he wished the race to end.
The safety car initially picked up George Russell instead of Verstappen, which prolonged the time spent under safety car conditions, and thus meant that the cars it had let go to eventually lock onto the race leader did not have enough time to catch up.
This denied the home fans a chance to see Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc have a tilt at passing Verstappen for victory, and Horner empathised with the tifosi – stating that the safety car denied a “grandstand finish”.
“We don’t want to win a race under a safety car,” Horner told Sky F1.
“And that’s something that we’ve talked about for many, many years that they should finish racing. There was enough time to get that race going. I think they picked up the wrong car, they picked up George Russell.
“We had the faster car, and we would have liked to have won the race on the track, not behind the safety car. So we share the disappointment of all the fans because it took away a grandstand finish.”
Horner said that, given the pace of Verstappen, the Red Bull squad was primed for victory anyway without the safety car – but noted there was a slight tyre off-set between the two drivers contending for the win after their safety car stops, with Leclerc on a scrubbed set of softs while Verstappen had a brand new set if the race got going again.
The Briton also questioned why the clean-up operation for Ricciardo’s car took so long, given the car was simply stopped at the side of the track.
“I’d just like to see the race play out. And, you know, I think we would have won it if there hadn’t been a safety car, we had enough pace in hand on the one stop that we’d adopted.
“We’d saved a new set of tyres, we had a new set versus Charles’s scrubbed set. But it was also for a grandstand finish that we didn’t get to see.
“And I think it goes against the principles of what we’ve discussed previously. So the biggest losers today, unfortunately, were the fans. But we need to look quickly to address it.
“We need to go through the details of it. But for me, there was more than enough time to get that race going again. And again with a car that wasn’t in a barrier. It was parked on the side of the track.”
Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc was feeling frustration when the Italian Grand Prix fate was sealed before safety car finish. Motorsport.com has the full details.
Charles Leclerc admitted that a safety car finish to Formula 1’s Italian Grand Prix was “frustrating”, but losing the race had been settled long before that.
The Ferrari driver had led in the opening stages at Monza from pole position but elected to go for an early change of tyres when there was a virtual safety car period prompted by Sebastian Vettel’s retirement.
That move put him on an alternative two-stop strategy, with the extra stop and lack of pace compared to eventual winner Max Verstappen leaving him well adrift as the laps counted down.
But the possibility opened up for a potential showdown with Verstappen as Daniel Ricciardo’s late retirement with an engine problem brought out the safety car.
However, delays in retrieving the stricken McLaren, as well as the safety car taking several laps to pick up race leader Max Verstappen, meant the laps ran out to allow a restart.
Following protocols which were ignored in Abu Dhabi last year, that the race can only restart one lap after lapped cars have been unleashed, there was no scope to go for a last-lap fight once the cars were in order.
Much to the annoyance of the local Ferrari fans, who booed the cars as they took the chequered flag, Verstappen came home unchallenged for his first victory at Monza.
Reflecting on the end of the race, Leclerc admitted he was eager for the race to resume but said that his defeat to Verstappen had been set in stone much earlier.
“I mean, the end was frustrating,” he said. “I wish we could have ended up racing, but unfortunately we were second at that place, because of what happened before. So it’s a shame.
“But overall, I gave it all for P2 today. I wish I could have won in front of the amazing tifosi we have here, but I just couldn’t today.”
Leclerc said that he and Ferrari went for the early virtual safety car stop just to be sure to cover off the cars behind, but would obviously need to dig deeper into whether or not the choice was right.
“We didn’t know what they were going to do behind, so we took that choice,” he explained.
Asked if he was happy with the decision, he said: “Well, obviously we’ve finished P2 so I’m not extremely happy with the race. But yeah, we’ll work on that.”
Williams driver Nyck De Vries reprimanded for “erratic driving” incident at Italian Grand Prix. Motorsport.com provides the story.
Nyck de Vries has escaped with a reprimand after being summoned to the stewards after his first Formula 1 race at the Italian Grand Prix, for “erratic driving”.
The Dutchman, a late call-up into the Williams team after Alex Albon was sidelined with appendicitis, spent almost the entirety of the race defending from Zhou as he sought to preserve a points-scoring debut run and was classified ninth at the flag.
Zhou was within a second of de Vries for the majority of the race, but was unable to mount an assault on the Williams stand-in as the two were caught in a DRS train behind Pierre Gasly.
The time of the incident cited by the stewards was registered at 16:15 local time, under the safety car period at the end of the race.
This was due to a moment where de Vries stopped suddenly behind Gasly behind the safety car, having reduced his speed to remain above the ‘delta time’ – the minimum time all drivers must run to or above in such conditions.
Having heard the evidence from de Vries and Williams, the stewards levied him with a reprimand and nothing more – having accepted that the driver was not completely acquainted with all of the systems on board the car, and had not received advice from the team.
“The driver advised that after the second lap under the Safety Car he was unsure about why his display was showing that he was at risk of being under the delta time,” read the report.
“At the same time, he was dealing with brake issues and was in radio contact with the Team over this issue, so did not get any advice from the Team in relation to his delta.
“He therefore reduced speed in order to remain above the delta time.
“The Stewards took note of the fact that the driver was a “last minute” replacement for the usual team driver and had driven this car for the first time in FP3 at this event. Therefore, in mitigation the Stewards decide to impose the penalty of a Reprimand instead of a higher penalty.”
De Vries had started eighth on the grid after the series of penalties shuffled the order ahead of the race, but remained on the tail of the emerging DRS train consisting of Daniel Ricciardo, Gasly, and Lando Norris – with Zhou just behind.
During the course of the race, de Vries was also shown the black-and-white flag for track limits after having three of his laps chalked off for surpassing the bounding white line.
After the pitstop phase, de Vries was running in 10th and in Gasly’s wake, but did not have enough forward impetus to mount an assault on the French driver.
This brought Zhou, who had dropped slightly after the stops, back to within the one-second barrier necessary to join the DRS train.
Although Zhou continued to give de Vries a headache, the Frieslander enjoyed some respite from the Chinese rookie’s presence in his mirrors when Max Verstappen came up to lap the pair – which cost Zhou more time relative to de Vries.
As the race was neutralised under the safety car, de Vries crossed the line ninth to collect two points, moving ahead of one-time teammate Nicholas Latifi in the drivers’ championship and putting Williams onto six points for the season.
The FIA has explained why it didn’t restart the Formula 1 Italian Grand Prix, which ended under safety car conditions on Sunday to secure victory for Max Verstappen.
Red Bull driver Verstappen had been leading the race after Ferrari polesitter Charles Leclerc made a second pitstop to change back onto a set of soft tyres.
He had been closing slowly on Verstappen, who was running a one-stop strategy on medium tyres, when Daniel Ricciardo stopped his McLaren between the two Lesmo corners with his car stuck in gear.
The car could not be moved back behind the barriers and required a crane to lift it from the roadside.
While the leaders pitted for fresh tyres in anticipation of a restart, the race remained under safety car conditions to the end, prompting frustration both from runner-up Leclerc and Verstappen’s team boss Christian Horner.
“There was enough time to get that race going,” Horner told Sky. “I think they picked up the wrong car, they picked up George Russell.”
The FIA has now responded to explain why the race ended under caution, stating that the severity of the incident was not great enough to warrant a red flag.
An FIA spokesperson said: “While every effort was made to recover Car #3 quickly and resume racing, the situation developed and marshals were unable to put the car into neutral and push it into the escape road.
“As the safety of the recovery operation is our only priority, and the incident was not significant enough to require a red flag, the race ended under safety car following the procedures agreed between the FIA and all Competitors.
“The timing of the safety car period within a race has no bearing on this procedure.”
Leclerc conceded that the safety car interruption had not unduly altered the outcome of his race.
“I wish we could have ended up racing, but unfortunately we were second at that place, because of what happened before,” he said.
Asked by Motorsport.com to explain what had happened, Ricciardo said he had no warning that the car was about to shut down, explaining that there was “nothing I could do”.
“It just switched off,” he said. “I didn’t feel any warning signs, I was in Lesmo 1 and then just nothing. And because then it was off, I was in gear.
“So I tried to pull over to the inside, off the racing line obviously to a safe area as soon as possible, but I couldn’t see anywhere where I could pull in so I just had to stop on the grass and that was it.
“I tried to get out of the car as quick as possible and do what I could, but obviously I heard at the end that the race ended like that under safety car. So a shame for the race but nothing I could do.”
The earlier Formula 3 feature race was red-flagged for a crash involving Kush Maini and Brad Benavides on the exit of the second Lesmo, with the former’s MP Motorsport car spinning across the bows of his Carlin rival.
This ultimately determined the championship in favour of ART driver Victor Martins, who only lost one place to a five-second penalty for a track limits infringement and thus was classified fourth.
Source: Motorsport.com