#ItalianGP FP2 Report: @LewisHamilton leads @MercedesAMGF1 one-two. #F1

Lewis Hamilton topped the afternoon FP2 session at the Italian GP ahead of Mercedes team-mate Valtteri Bottas while Renault’s Daniel Ricciardo lost third due to exceeding track limits.

Ricciardo running too wide at the Parabolica exit meant that McLaren’s Lando Norris ended the day third despite missing the halfway point of the 90 minute session as the Woking-based outfit investigated a power-unit issue, in-front of AlphaTauri’s fourth-placed Pierre Gasly and Red Bull Racing’s fifth-place Max Verstappen.

Under sunny skies in Monza – with more Ferrari banners filling the Tifosi-less empty grandstands opposite the team’s garage during FP2 – the session took off to a quiet start before Alfa Romeo Racing’s Kimi Raikkonen emerged.

Raikkonen, who at one moment in the early stages suffered a snap of oversteer in his Ferrari-powered C39 racer, posted the benchmark of a 1:22.959 on the C3 medium rubber, before Red Bull Racing’s Alexander Albon and Racing Point’s Lance Stroll knocked the Finn off the top of the time-sheets.

Albon running the C2 hards during that stage, then reclaimed P1 with a 1:22.324, before Gasly improved with a quicker effort on the mediums.

The Frenchman went even quicker in his Honda-powered AT01 AlphaTauri, lowering his benchmark to a 1:21.578, as he also had a moment exiting the Variante Della Roggia turn five chicane by dipping his left-hand side wheels into the gravel trap.

After the first 20 minutes, Verstappen and Hamilton took to the circuit, while Bottas spent an extra five minutes in the Mercedes garage before emerging on the C2 white side-walled harder compounds.

Just before his team-mate came out of the pits, Hamilton claimed top spot with a 1:21.085 running the C3 yellow-branded mediums.

A few drivers, including the Ferrari pairing, had their lap-time efforts invalidated for running too wide at Parabolica, but during the mid-session qualifying simulation runs it proved much more costly.

After a long period of no action before the mid-way point, the field headed out as they made their way out slowly on their installation laps on the C4 red side-walled softs with a traffic jam on the back straight.

Sports-governing body, the FIA, warned the ten teams that during FP3 and Qualifying, it would used benchmark times to determine if a driver has travelled so slowly ahead of their hot-laps – as the FIA seeks to avoid a repeat of last year’s traffic jam scenario in Q3.

After being warned of a train with “15 cars”, Bottas flew his way round the Autodromo Nazionale Monza with a quick effort of a 1:20.454, but then Mercedes team-mate Hamilton pipped his team-mate by 0.262 seconds posing a 1:20.192, which was the benchmark in FP2 at the Italian GP.

In the field behind, Gasly – who went off the track at the Variante Del Rettifilo late on after reporting something “bouncing in the back” of his AT01 racer, was one of the final drivers to set a lap-time on the C4 red-marked softer tyres, which left the Frenchman 0.929 seconds adrift of Hamilton’s Italian GP FP2 top effort, but 0.107 seconds in-front of Verstappen, who ended up in fourth following Ricciardo’s lap-time effort deletion.

The Australian posted a 1:20.905 – which would have made him the only driver to reach the 1:20’s alongside the Mercedes duo – but the Renault driver lost it for exceeding track limits at the exit of the Parabolica.

This dropped him to 15th based on his previous effort on the mediums, with Albon also suffering the same fate in 14th – who set a 1:21.531, which could have put the Red Bull driver tenth.

Norris ran out of sequence with the field after his long-wait in the McLaren garage, but he moved into third, posting a 1:21.089 with five minutes remaining after pushing everyone from Gasly to Albon down by one spot.

The Briton also had his lap-time invalidated on the next tour, while Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel also lost his effort for the same Parabolica infringement, but the four-time world champion was able to improve on a following lap during his long-pace runs that ended the session.

McLaren’s Carlos Sainz was sixth and ahead of AlphaTauri’s Daniil Kvyat who took seventh, Racing Point’s Stroll who ended up eighth and Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc taking ninth with his team-mate Vettel in 12th after finishing a low 19th in the earlier opening practice session.

Both Ferrari drivers suffered off-track excursions in the closing stages, with Vettel spinning in-front of Ricciardo as he exited the first Lesmo corner and his rear almost hitting the barriers at low speed, whilst Leclerc had a similar moment as the rear of his SF1000 racer also snapped left as he went through the same corner moments later.

Leclerc was able to continue on but ran off into the gravel trap and said over his team-radio: “the car is so hard to drive”.

BWT Racing Point’s Sergio Perez completed the top ten with Renault’s Esteban Ocon behind the Mexican in 11th.

Alfa Romeo Racing’s Antonio Giovinazzi was 13th and in-front of the aforementioned Albon and Ricciardo.

Haas F1 Team pairing Kevin Magnussen and Romain Grosjean were 16th and 18th respectively with Raikkonen sandwiched in-between taking 17th.

The Williams Racing duo of Nicholas Latifi and George Russel brought up the rear.

You can see the full Formula 1 Gran Premio Heineken D’Italia 2020 Free Practice 2 Results Classifications at the link: https://www.formula1.com/en/results.html/2020/races/1052/italy/practice-2.html

In the earlier FP1 session, it was Bottas on top of the time-sheets ahead of Mercedes team-mate Hamilton with Red Bull’s Albon third, AlphaTauri’s Kvyat fourth and Verstappen rounding out the top five. Catch up on the opening practice session highlights at the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ooInCcz2n4w

Catch up on this weekend’s race preview at the following link:

#F1 Gran Premio @Heineken D’Italia 2020 Preview. #ItalianGP

F1 heading back to South Australia?:

#F1 on @thebend_msp radar if #Melbourne cancels again. #Adelaide