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Alex Kalinauckas

F1 Italian GP: Sainz tops FP2 from Norris as Perez crashes

Oscar Piastri nipped ahead of Max Verstappen in fourth during the session that was twice halted, with Charles Leclerc, so far the slower of the two Ferrari cars throughout practice at Monza, sixth in front of the Tifosi.

Before any drivers could set a representative time in Friday's second F1 session, the session was halted after it had barely begun due to Lance Stroll stopping his Aston Martin just past the Ascari chicane.

Having missed FP1 with Aston junior and reserve driver Felipe Drugovich driving his AMR23, Stroll was forced to stop at this point of the track with a fuel system issue.

Aston attempted to fire the car back up remotely, but Stroll was eventually forced to climb out as the red flags flew, these remaining in place until the restart with 10 minutes on the clock.

After this, Verstappen led the way with a 1m22.259s set on the medium tyres, before nearly 10 minutes later the Ferrari pair blitzed ahead, Sainz becoming the frontrunner with a 1m21.565s.

A long lull in action followed before the frontrunners headed out on the soft tyres, the Williams cars and Fernando Alonso had already sampled the red-walled rubber early in FP2 – with the times set to tumble due to the softer compound being used and the track evolving fast.

The Ferrari pair led the way at this point just past the halfway point and looked to be set to gain, with Leclerc posting a personal best on the softs but still not toppling Sainz's medium tyre time, with the Spaniard backing out of his first qualifying simulation run due to rear locking at the second chicane.

Perez therefore blasted ahead with his first softs run to post a 1m21.540s, then he towed Verstappen to the first corner before the Dutchman continued solo on his opening softs flier that ended with him still adrift of Sainz's previous benchmark.

Next through were the McLaren pair, with Norris shooting to the top of the times with a 1m21.374s, before Sainz completed a second run on the softs to finally get back to first place with a 1m21.355s.

With just over 20 minutes remaining, Verstappen, who had encountered lots of traffic at the second Lesmo on his qualifying simulation lap, requested to have a second attempt but was denied by Red Bull.

That set the leaderboard, with Alex Albon seventh for Williams but with his best time during the lower fuel running being set on the medium tyres.

This reflects the unusual run plans teams are employing as part of F1's second 2023 Alternative Tyre Allocation experiment, with Mercedes keeping Lewis Hamilton on the harder rubber and eschewing a soft tyre run.

He therefore finished down in 17th in the times and was lucky to escape an investigation from the stewards for appearing to impede Piastri at the second chicane during the early laps.

George Russell did do a soft tyre flier for Mercedes, but could only trail Alonso in eighth and ninth, as Nico Hulkenberg rounded out the top 10.

FP2 concluded with the typical high-fuel data gathering, where several drivers – including Yuki Tsunoda, 14th for AlphaTauri – complained about traffic issues and Hamilton dipped his left-side wheels into the gravel exiting the second chicane.

But Perez had the most dramatic moment, losing the rear of his RB19 at the Parabolica with nine minutes remaining after dipping his left front wheel off the track and spinning backwards through the huge gravel trap at the long, fast and sweeping hairpin.

Perez missed most of the tyre wall as he fought the spin, but did glance the barriers with his rear wing, which escaped major damage and so the red flags came out again.

The session resumed for four final minutes, during which the order did not change.

 
 
       
Driver Info
 
 
 
   
Cla Driver # Chassis Engine Laps Time Interval km/h
1 Spain C. Sainz Carlos Sainz Ferrari 55 Ferrari Ferrari 23 1'21.355   256.343
2 United Kingdom L. Norris Lando Norris McLaren 4 McLaren Mercedes 20 +0.019 0.019 256.283
3 Mexico S. Perez Sergio Perez Red Bull Racing 11 Red Bull Red Bull 17 +0.185 0.166 255.761
4 Australia O. Piastri Oscar Piastri McLaren 81 McLaren Mercedes 21 +0.190 0.005 255.745
5 Netherlands M. Verstappen Max Verstappen Red Bull Racing 1 Red Bull Red Bull 20 +0.276 0.086 255.476
6 Monaco C. Leclerc Charles Leclerc Ferrari 16 Ferrari Ferrari 23 +0.361 0.085 255.210
7 Thailand A. Albon Alex Albon Williams 23 Williams Mercedes 19 +0.624 0.263 254.391
8 Spain F. Alonso Fernando Alonso Aston Martin Racing 14 Aston Martin Mercedes 16 +0.716 0.092 254.106
9 United Kingdom G. Russell George Russell Mercedes 63 Mercedes Mercedes 20 +0.821 0.105 253.782
10 Germany N. Hulkenberg Nico Hulkenberg Haas F1 Team 27 Haas Ferrari 19 +0.936 0.115 253.427
11 Denmark K. Magnussen Kevin Magnussen Haas F1 Team 20 Haas Ferrari 21 +1.219 0.283 252.558
12 Finland V. Bottas Valtteri Bottas Alfa Romeo 77 Alfa Romeo Ferrari 19 +1.240 0.021 252.494
13 France P. Gasly Pierre Gasly Alpine 10 Alpine Renault 22 +1.296 0.056 252.323
14 Japan Y. Tsunoda Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri 22 AlphaTauri Red Bull 23 +1.341 0.045 252.186
15 France E. Ocon Esteban Ocon Alpine 31 Alpine Renault 22 +1.361 0.020 252.125
16 United States L. Sargeant Logan Sargeant Williams 2 Williams Mercedes 24 +1.400 0.039 252.006
17 United Kingdom L. Hamilton Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 44 Mercedes Mercedes 23 +1.428 0.028 251.921
18 New Zealand L. Lawson Liam Lawson AlphaTauri 40 AlphaTauri Red Bull 23 +1.812 0.384 250.758
19 China Z. Guanyu Zhou Guanyu Alfa Romeo 24 Alfa Romeo Ferrari 20 +1.991 0.179 250.219
20 Canada L. Stroll Lance Stroll Aston Martin Racing 18 Aston Martin Mercedes 2      
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