Monza: Sebastian Vettel got the better of Fernando Alonso to win the Italian Grand Prix here on Sunday. With this win, the Red Bull driver extended his lead in the drivers' world championship to more than 50 points.
Vettel came home 5.4 seconds clear of Alonso, as the Ferrari driver thrilled with a battling chase in pursuit ahead of third-placed Australian Mark Webber in the second Red Bull and Brazilian Felipe Massa, fourth in the second Ferrari.
Meanwhile, starting from pole position, Vettel held his lead into the first chicane despite a determined charge from Mark, who started alongside his team-mate on the front row.
Vettel said after the race that it was fantastic to win the event again. “I just managed to make turn one! I locked the front right and it just didn’t seem to come back. I had a big flat spot, which I felt straight away and I wasn’t sure if the tyre would survive, but fortunately I managed to make it round and have a strong first stint. I pushed straight away to get a bit of a gap, in case we had to stop early and change to a two-stop strategy,” he said.
“We had a gearbox issue and I had to short shift, which meant we dropped some time in the straights – but I tried to make it up in the corners. It’s great to finish on the top step. The podium here is always very passionate. We are in Italy and when you walk around outside the track, you see Ferrari clothing and merchandise in all the shops starting from the smallest sizes upwards; it’s part of their DNA, which I understand. It was great for the Tifosi to have Fernando on the podium today. The season is going well and we’re pushing hard, but we take each race as it comes. We’re looking forward to Singapore next, which I want to finish; I think it’s the toughest race we have all year,” Vettel added.
Mark Webber said, “It’s a great place here and it’s very special to finish on the podium. It’s not the circuit where I’ve had the best results in the past, so it’s a bit of a personal best for me in qualifying and the race. I felt better on the soft tyres today; I had a good battle with Fernando, fair play to him on that and then afterwards I settled in to getting my head down and getting on with the race. We got Felipe on the stop, which was great. I was happy with my in-lap, the pit stop was great and then my out-lap was strong, so we cleared him reasonably comfortably. We had to nurse the gearbox a bit at the end, but overall it was a good result. Seb is very strong around here and it was great to get such a good result today.”
Meanwhile, Christian Horner, Team Principal said: “A fantastic way to achieve our 40th victory and Sebastian’s 32nd. To win and finish third in Monza, which is one of the most historic events, is testimony to our strong team work today. It’s been a fantastic effort behind the scenes in preparation for this event. We had some issues that we had to manage during the race and the pit stops in particular were great and enabled Mark to get ahead of Felipe Massa. It’s very impressive how the whole team have all contributed to this fantastic result.”
