2024 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix Wrap Up

Staff Writer Will Black summarises the events of this season’s Imola Grand Prix.

A last lap dash, an unfortunate Albon, and worrying times for Perez. Let’s wrap up the GP at Imola.

Alpine

Much like in Miami, the Alpine cars seemed to have much more pace. Their steady improvements weren’t enough to get them into the points this weekend but it is positive for the French team. Pierre Gasly finished P16 with his teammate Esteban Ocon ahead of him in P14.

Aston Martin 

Fernando Alonso’s race started from the pit lane this weekend as the Aston team decided to make modifications to the car under Parc Ferme. He wasn’t, however, able to make up any positions after a slow stop which further hampered his race finishing P19. Lance Stroll was able to get a couple of points for Aston Martin with a P9 finish but it is clear that the car is not nearly as competitive as it was last season. The team has had diminishing results as the calendar has rolled and improvements will need to be made quickly.

Ferrari

The Ferraris looked very quick this weekend as they split the McLarens on the starting grid. The main mistake came as they possibly left their pit stops too late which allowed for the McLarens to do an undercut and finish ahead of the Ferrari’s by the chequered flag. Charles Leclerc maintained a podium finish with P3 and Carlos Sainz finished P5.

Haas

The Haas were both running quickly in Italy but did not have enough pace to take home any championship points. Nico Hulkenberg finished just outside the points in P11 and teammate Kevin Magnussen ended the race in P12.

Kick Sauber

The only thing to report on Sauber is that they managed to have a set of decent pitstops this weekend. It seems the wheel nut issues that had been plaguing their stops have been solved and hopefully the team can look toward scoring some points. Zhou Guanyu finished P15 and Valtteri Bottas finished P18.

Mercedes

Most of the fighting done by the Mercedes cars this weekend was between themselves. Both George Russell and Lewis Hamilton were going for P6 but seemed quite far off the Ferraris and McLarens. Hamilton spoke of his frustration with the car following the end of the race and I can imagine he is hoping for a much quicker car when he joins Ferrari next year. Hamilton maintained his P6 finish with Russell behind him in P7.

McLaren

Oscar Piastri was unfortunate this weekend. He managed P2 in qualifying but was hit with a three-place grid penalty for impeding pushing him down to P5. The Australian was quick on Sunday nonetheless and managed to overtake Sainz to finish P4. Lando Norris brought the most excitement to Sunday’s race however as he began to push up to Max Verstappen in the dying stages of the race. He was moved up to P2 on the starting grid after Piastri’s penalty and was able to fight against the Ferrari’s behind. After he put a bit of space between himself and Leclerc, Norris started to push and finished the race only 7 tenths off of Verstappen. Like in Miami, this weekend pushed a bit more fire into the hope that the Driver’s Championship won’t be dominated by Verstappen.   

RB

After decent qualifying for the RBs both drivers dropped positions quickly at the start. Yuki Tsunoda out-qualfied his teammate Daniel Ricciardo once again. Ricciardo’s seat looks less and less secure each weekend as his much younger, and currently quicker, teammate beats him. Tsunoda held onto a single championship point with a P10 finish but Ricciardo was unable to replicate finishing P13.

Red Bull

Sergio Perez’s weekend was not at all what he would’ve be looking for. He was knocked out of Q2 and started the race in P11 and was only able to make up three places to finish P8. He wasn’t helped after he went off the track on lap 18 losing even more time. Verstappen was able to push at the start of the race and created a decent gap between himself and Norris. Yet the domination of the Red Bull car doesn’t seem as clear-cut as it has the past few seasons. With Norris’ push on Verstappen at the end of the race it seems that Red Bull might not have the quickest car every weekend. As a side note, while racing at Imola, Max Verstappen’s iRacing team won the Nurburgring 24 hours, making him possibly the first F1 driver to win two races in one day, even if it is simulator racing.

Williams

Alexander Albon had an unfortunate race in Italy. On lap 10 he was forced into the pits a call came in that his tyre was not on properly. He switched to the hard tyre but was immediately a lap down with a ten second penalty due to the tyre not being on correctly. All was lost on lap 54 as Albon then faced engine issues forcing his retirement. Logan Sargeant finished P17.

Results

Looking Ahead

Race 8: Monaco, Circuit de Monaco, May 24-26