There wasn’t much more to do than follow the car in front. PETER COSTER reports on the Imola Grand Prix:
Boooooooooooring was the verdict of one fan on social media after the Emilio Romagna Grand Prix on Sunday and, yes, I counted the letters.
The two Australians on the grid said the same thing. Oscar Piastri might have won the race had he not been penalised three grid spots through no foul of his own and Daniel Ricciardo might not have won the race but had the same problem.
The Imola circuit, named after Enzo and Dino Ferrari, is narrow. It makes it hard to pass.
Piastri would have been on pole had not pole sitter and eventual race winner Max Verstappen not picked up a handy tow in qualifying.
Even so, Piastri qualified beside him, less than a tenth of a second adrift, but was penalised three grid places because his McLaren team failed to tell him another car was closing on him quickly.
The stewards blamed the team for what could have been an accident and in his own words Piastri said he spent 20 laps behind Carlos Sainz in the Ferrari because there was no room to pass. He finished fourth behind behind Verstappen, Lando Norris in the other McLaren and Charles Leclerc in the Ferrari after getting in front of Sainz after a pit stop.
Ricciardo in the Visa RB had the same problem but he wasn’t going to win anyway having qualified back in the pack.
He started ninth and finished thirteenth, but once again behind teammate Yuki Tsunoda who started seventh and finished in tenth.
While Ricciardo has struggled this season, the Japanese driver has recorded the best results of his career, yet it was the Perth driver who was expected to bring home the points.
Drivers generally moaned about the Imola track, calling it “old school,” that it was “bumpy,” that the cars “porpoised” and that they were caught in a “DRS train,” which all meant they couldn’t pass each other.
The DRS train is when the cars are separated by no more than a second, which allows them to keep their rear wings open but they can’t overtake because they all have the same advantage.
The complaints from the crowd and the worldwide television audience of 100 million, yes, 100 million, were also because Max Verstappen won yet again in the Red Bull.
It was the his 59th victory, his fifth win from seven races this year following 19 wins from 22 races last year and a likely fourth world championship this year.
The Dutch wunderkind did not say the race was boring, but then again he was the winner and held off Lando Norris in the McLaren by only seven tenths of a second in an ailing car.
That might have been Piastri behind him, maybe in front of him in the second McLaren, were it not for the grid penalties.
Nevertheless, Verstappen finds a way to win while the rest are left to think what might have been their day to shine.
Race commentator and former F1 driver Karun Chandhok was left to say what “a sunny day” the fans had enjoyed, the race having delivered little, with the exception of Verstappen, who looked as if he could have been overtaken after leading the race from start to finish.
Even the weather became a talking point following the cloudburst last year that led to the Imola race being abandoned.
This year the weather was drenched in nostalgia on the 30th anniversary of the deaths of Ayrton Senna and Roland Ratzenberger.
For those old enough, the disbelief that washed over us as Murray Walker shouted, “It’s Senna,” when the Brazilian triple champion crashed at Tamburello was remembered anew.
Senna believed God protected him, but that might not have taken into account because of the rewelded steering column on his Williams.
The Brazilian wanted the steering column shortened but it was his life that was cut short in the day after his friend Ratzenberger died in a practice accident.
The steering column on Senna’s car snapped, causing the Willims to hit the wall at Tamburello head on with the great driver a mere passenger.
At Imola on Sunday, the Brazilian’s death would have been in the minds of drivers as well as those of us who remembered.
There were many deaths in those days when safety was forgotten in the need for speed.
Now, drivers’ lives are paramount with the once controversial “halo” saving the lives of such as seven-times world champion Lewis Hamilton.
Max Verstappen ran across the top of Hamilton’s Mercedes during the 2021 race at Monza.
But back to sunny Sunday at Imola and race commentators having so little to talk about they left to niggling each other.
Chandhok said Benjamin’s career as a commentator was as short as his his appearances on the West End stage as as actor.
To which Benjamin retorted was about the same as Chandhok’s time in an F1 seat as a driver.
Calm down boys.
Benjamin trained as an actor at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts and is only behind the microphone for three races while David Croft takes time off from the longest season since the F1 championship started in 1950.
Chandhok was behind the wheel in 11 races for Hispania and Team Lotus after two years as a test driver for Red Bull.
One of only two Indian drivers in F1, Chandhok should avoid any scuffles in the commentary box. He is short, even for an F1 driver, at five foot eight, while Benjamin is six foot five and wears size 16 boots; all the better to kick you with.
Just joking.
Crofty is back this Sunday for the Monaco Grand Prix and Benjamin returns for the Austrian and Azerbaijan races while Croft gets married.
Still, no love lost while he’s away.
Monaco is a circuit where it is even harder to pass than Imola but makes up for it with an atmosphere like no other.
Princess Grace, the American actress who married Prince Rainier and died at the age of 52 after a mysterious car crash, brought an unequalled glamour to the race.
The harbour is the aquatic equivalent of a car park as the famous and the merely notorious party on their super yachts.
Will it be another sunny Sunday?
Somerset Maugham famously wrote that the French Riveria was “a sunny place for shady people.”
The race drivers who live there do so not only for the weather, but because it’s one of the world’s great tax havens. That suits everybody.
Results of the 2024 Italian Grand Prix
19th May 2024
| POS | DRIVER | CAR | TIME |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Max Verstappen | RED BULL RACING HONDA RBPT | 25:25.3 |
| 2 | Lando Norris | MCLAREN MERCEDES | +0.725s |
| 3 | Charles Leclerc | FERRARI | +7.916s |
| 4 | Oscar Piastri | MCLAREN MERCEDES | +14.132s |
| 5 | Carlos Sainz | FERRARI | +22.325s |
| 6 | Lewis Hamilton | MERCEDES | +35.104s |
| 7 | George Russell | MERCEDES | +47.154s |
| 8 | Sergio Perez | RED BULL RACING HONDA RBPT | +54.776s |
| 9 | Lance Stroll | ASTON MARTIN ARAMCO MERCEDES | +79.556s |
| 10 | Yuki Tsunoda | RB HONDA RBPT | +1 lap |
| 11 | Nico Hulkenberg | HAAS FERRARI | +1 lap |
| 12 | Kevin Magnussen | HAAS FERRARI | +1 lap |
| 13 | Daniel Ricciardo | RB HONDA RBPT | +1 lap |
| 14 | Esteban Ocon | ALPINE RENAULT | +1 lap |
| 15 | Zhou Guanyu | KICK SAUBER FERRARI | +1 lap |
| 16 | Pierre Gasly | ALPINE RENAULT | +1 lap |
| 17 | Logan Sargeant | WILLIAMS MERCEDES | +1 lap |
| 18 | Valtteri Bottas | KICK SAUBER FERRARI | +1 lap |
| 19 | Fernando Alonso | ASTON MARTIN ARAMCO MERCEDES | +1 lap |
| NC | Alexander Albon | WILLIAMS MERCEDES | DNF |
PETER COSTER is a former editor and foreign correspondent who has covered a range of international sports, including world championship fights and the Olympic Games.
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