Reuters
Monza (Italy), Sept 6: A red-hot Lewis Hamilton won the Italian Grand Prix to take a 53-point lead in the Formula One championship Sunday after Mercedes teammate and closest rival Nico Rosberg retired with his car in flames.
However the Briton faced a post-race stewards enquiry for low tyre pressures at the start, with the possibility of a time penalty being imposed.
Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel took second place, 25 seconds behind Hamilton, to give local fans something to cheer.
Brazilian Felipe Massa took third for Williams, crossing the line 0.3 of a second ahead of his Finnish teammate Valtteri Bottas.
The win was the 40th of Hamilton’s career, one less than the career tally of his boyhood hero Ayrton Senna, and seventh of the season as well as his third in Monza.
“This weekend’s been just fantastic, a perfect weekend for me,” said the Briton. “I don’t know if I have ever had a weekend like this. This circuit is such a special one for me. The sea of fans is just unlike anything I’ve seen.”
If his race was untroubled, there were concerned faces afterwards at Mercedes when stewards reported that the left rear tyre on Hamilton’s car was 0.3 PSI below the minimum starting pressure specified by Pirelli.
A team representative was summoned to the stewards, with fears he could face a penalty that might wipe out his advantage over Vettel, and possibly more.
“I’ve no idea what that might be,” Mercedes motorsport head Toto Wolff said.
Rosberg’s tyre had even less pressure but the German was past caring, his hopes literally going up in flames when the German pulled over two laps from the end with smoke and flames billowing out from the rear of his car while in third place.
The German had started fourth but lost places taking evasive action when Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen, on the front row with Hamilton, struggled to get away with cars swerving around on either side. The Finn was last into the first corner but fought back to take fifth place.
FI bag double points
Monza (Italy): Force India (FI) regained fifth place in the team standings with their biggest points haul this F1 season as Sergio Perez and Nico Hulkenberg finished sixth and seventh respectively in the Italian Grand Prix here Sunday. Perez, who was passed by Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen towards the end of the 53-lap race for sixth place, regained his spot after Nico Rosberg in the Mercedes dramatically suffered an engine failure while running third. The seventh place was a welcome result for Mexican Hulkenberg, who suffered retirements in his last two outings. The double points finish, Force India’s fourth of the season, fetched the team 14 points replacing Lotus at fifth spot.