It is the summer break for F1 as all teams take a couple weeks off before resuming in the Netherlands on August 23rd.

The last race prior to the break was in Hungary at the Hungaroring, a quirky, relatively low speed, multiple corner (high speed and low speed) track that is really unlike any other track on the current circuit. So, this race typically shakes things up and it kinda did here. In practice, the Ferrari's were pretty dominant and looked like the team to beat, but Lando Norris (McLaren) came out of nowhere really and got the pole with Ferrari's Lewis Hamilton in 2nd and Charles LeClerc in 3rd before a 3-spot grid penalty pushed Lewis to 5th and LeClerc on the front row. Kimi Antonelli was 4th and George Russell, who is having a tough stretch down in 7th. But the FIA Stewards gave Antonelli a 3-spot grid penalty for not lifting enough when Verstappen spun and a yellow flag came out. I'm an Antonelli fan and feel the FIA (the governing board who levies penalties and the like) has been overly heavy handed where Antonelli is concerned. George Russell did the same thing Antonelli did in Austria when Verstappen went off track in qualifying lifting less than Antonelli and NO penalty. Alas, we move on!

Verstappen with all the grid penalties still finished 4th on the starting grid and his gritty teammate Isack Hadjar was 8th.

The race was also a quirky battle with Oscar Piastri (Norris' teammate at McLaren) moving up and taking the lead for a while. He would end up getting taken out of the race by a frustrated Carlos Sainz of Williams who got a 5 second penalty, but it could have taken a win from Piastri. Oh well. As the laps went by and the pit stops went by, Lando Norris emerged in front by a long way (about 15 seconds), Max Verstappen (RedBull) in second (Max would make a KILLER pass on Lewis Hamilton earlier in the race and prove to all that he is still the best driver in the world). Then Antonelli would pit and put on hard tyres and reenter the race and be in front of the Ferraris, but a late caution allowed Ferrari to make a late pit which they did but they couldn't beat Antonelli to the line and emerged behind the Mercedes man on track but with the faster soft tyres. But Hamilton was penalized for speeding in the pit lane, so it didn't matter in the end and even if it didn't, they still didn't pass Antonelli on track. So, the young Italian came home in 3rd place. His teammate was down in 7th.

So, looking into the last half of the year, Antonelli leads the Drivers' Championship by 60 points over Hamilton, 69 over his teammate Russell (who I know loses sleep over that), 81 over Leclerc and 91 over Norris. Not many tracks will suit Mercedes less than Hungary, but can the youngster Antonelli battle through the stress and pressure to capture the title? We shall see as McLaren seem pretty strong now too, but was that just because of the quirky track in Hungary or can they stay in front at tracks with a lot of long straights, which has been Mercedes strength all year? We shall see.

Finally, I have heard those a lot smarter than me in racing speak about wind tunnels and how they help aerodynamic car designers with their work and I felt I knew that general gist of that and suppose I did, but the link below really explains and shows what actually happens and it's pretty fascinating to me anyway. Hope you enjoy!

How Mercedes' wind tunnel mistake ended their Formula 1 dominance | Watch

From F1 Lead on Facebook.

From F1.

BREAKING: Yuki Tsunoda will drive for Racing Bulls in Zandvoort, taking the place of Liam Lawson who replaces the injured Hadjar at Red Bull Racing.

===========

Let's go Yuki!

LOT Going on at Red Bull:

• Hadjar is injured.

• Lawson moves from Little Brother Racing Bulls to Big Brother Red Bull for this the first race in about 3 weeks.

• And Yuki Tsunoda gets another shot here in Lawson's Racing Bulls car! He will be really focused in this race. Hoping he has a good one.

• But the BIGGEST NEWS is Max Verstappen, 4-Time World Champion, and IMO the best driver in the World signs a new 4-Year Contract with Red Bull. That is HUGE NEWS! Lot of speculation he would go to any number of teams, but I do think Red Bull is making progress. Case in point, the last race this year was in Hungary, where in 2025 Verstappen was terrible and finished 9th (terrible for him) and over 70 seconds behind Lando Norris that day. This year he was in the thick of it and finished second. And I may be naive in saying this, but I really think he has matured some and actually likes Isaac Hadjar and has helped him more than any other "teammate" he has ever had. Maybe and maybe not.

The last half of the season begins this week in the Netherlands, check it out! In the last 4 races, the top 6 drivers have been separated by a mere 9 points in the championship. That is incredible parity and makes for great racing. I'm biased but F1 is definitely worth your time to tune in. It's on Apple TV and they do a great job covering it. Better than ESPN IMO. Check it out!

5 hours ago, Purple88 said:

• But the BIGGEST NEWS is Max Verstappen, 4-Time World Champion, and IMO the best driver in the World signs a new 4-Year Contract with Red Bull. That is HUGE NEWS! Lot of speculation he would go to any number of teams, but I do think Red Bull is making progress. Case in point, the last race this year was in Hungary, where in 2025 Verstappen was terrible and finished 9th (terrible for him) and over 70 seconds behind Lando Norris that day. This year he was in the thick of it and finished second. And I may be naive in saying this, but I really think he has matured some and actually likes Isaac Hadjar and has helped him more than any other "teammate" he has ever had. Maybe and maybe not.

Russell is on the poll for the Sprint Race that starts at 6am this morning.

From Google:

Top 10 Sprint Qualifying Results

• 1. George Russell (Mercedes) — 1:11.567

• 2. Lando Norris (McLaren) — +0.041s

• 3. Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) — +0.055s

• 4. Oscar Piastri (McLaren) — +0.099s

• 5. Kimi Antonelli (Mercedes) — +0.227s

• 6. Max Verstappen (Red Bull) — +0.527s

• 7. Lewis Hamilton (Ferrari) — +0.624s

• 8. Pierre Gasly (Alpine) — +1.011s

• 9. Gabriel Bortoleto (Audi) — +1.016s

• 10. Arvid Lindblad (Racing Bulls) — +1.170s [1]

This week is the Italian Grand Prix at Monza. The race is tomorrow, but had to pipe in and give a HUGE shoutout to the Apine of Pierre Gasly who earns Pole Position!!! WOW! That is a HUGE accomplishment! Gasly actually won the Italian Grand Prix back in 2020. His teammate is down in 8th which is a great result for him (Colipinto) and a SUPER result already for Alpine!

Should be a great race tomorrow!

11 minutes ago, Purple88 said:

This week is the Italian Grand Prix at Monza. The race is tomorrow, but had to pipe in and give a HUGE shoutout to the Apine of Pierre Gasly who earns Pole Position!!! WOW! That is a HUGE accomplishment! Gasly actually won the Italian Grand Prix back in 2020. His teammate is down in 8th which is a great result for him (Colipinto) and a SUPER result already for Alpine!

Should be a great race tomorrow!

I am shocked about Gasly and I am going to watch qualifying here in a bit between games.

An incredible race today at the Italian Grand Prix!!!

This track is the oldest on the F1 circuit and dates back to 1922. It aligns as one of Ferrari's home tracks and the Tifosi (the VERY Loyal Ferrari Fan Base) come out in droves, hold HUGE signs and urge their home cars to bring home the victory; something Charles LeClerc did for the Italian Fans back in 2024 using great strategy to offset likely not having the best all-around car that day.

Well, the weekend started with a STUNNING Qualifying session that Alpine's Pierre Gasley, who is a better driver than the car he has (if you know what I mean) willed his blue and pink car to an incomprehensible Pole Position just beating the likely pole setter (George Russell-Merc) by under a tenth of a second. Just remarkable. His teammate, the young Argentine, Franco Colopinto did very well to reach 8th place to start.

Mercedes strategically decided to use Championship Leader Kimi Antonelli, the now 20-year-old Italian running in only his second home race, a grid penalty to add a new power unit here at Monza. They knew he would be able to use the speed difference and the ability to use the tow (where the car in front literally pulls the car behind in somewhat of a slingshot fashion) and make up many places on the grid.

So, at the start of the race, it was a wild scene going into the critical first turn, Gasly led Russell, but the Ferrari's nearly collide as LeClerc forces Hamilton wide. Was it too wide? I mean it is racing, but these two seem to battle each other harder than any car on the track. I guess that is a fundamental trait of F1 really. I have to say, I don't like that specific piece, but I've learned to understand it.

So, Hamilton gets shuffled back all the way to 8th. Also in that aftermath, LeClerc was compromised as Verstappen got around him and Piastri tried to as well on the inside. But LeClerc was fighting Piastri off, but likely at the very limit of his car and tyre grip at this point and he rolled onto a drainage grate alongside of the main track and lost traction, tried to correct and when the car regained grip it careened into the safety barrier at a very high rate of speed. Fortunately, he was ok, but the race was red flagged so the crews could repair the barrier.

Under red flag conditions, you are allowed to change tyres without penalty and most everyone did. But you also have to make sure you run two different tyre types (hard, medium, soft compounds are the choice). This helped pretty much everyone. But it meant Kimi Antonelli had to change off the hard compound tyre which he started the race with. Everyone else went to the hard tyre trying to not have to pit the rest of the way.

George Russell then led Gasley on the second start and Antonelli, who had moved from 19th position due to the grid penalty to 12th in 2 laps, passed 4 cars in the first corner and was 8th by the time they started their second lap of the restart. Just flying!!!

There was some good racing in here in between with Max Verstappen staying with the Mercedes for a time and even battling and passing Russell and then fighting him tooth and nail for a time. But Russell would eventually pass him for good. This Verstappen/Russell battle helped Antonelli catch up to the lead two cars and Antonelli would overtake them both by lap 26. But the tow was really strong today and Russell was able to stay with Antonelli and repassed him. Team orders at this time came to tell Antonelli to stop the yo-yo passing and try for the two teammates to get clear of Verstappen by over 1 second, which they did.

About this time, Lance Stroll (Aston Martin) had a problem (well they got a BIG problem, but I don't have time to discuss that) and brought out the Virtual Safety Car; and in a bang-bang decision Antonelli's crew and Verstappen's crew told their drivers to box (or pit). But Russell did not get that call. Remember Russell was on the hard tyre and likely could make it to the end or about 18 laps. But Antonelli and Verstappen were now on new tyres and they started their final march at that time with Antonelli on new Mediums and Verstappen on new Hards. These two only dropped to 5th and 6th on the grid and they stormed back through the line of cars with Antonelli catching Russell with about 5 laps to go. He tried to pass Russell in Turn 1 and tried to pass him to the outside, but too many marbles (many bits of tyre rubber and rocks and all sorts of debris on the track) out there and he skidded into the gravel trap but was able to continue but also gave Russell a 1.5 second reprieve. So Antonelli, chased his teammate down again and this time didn't wait for Turn 1 as Russell likely expected, he passed him before the Parabolica (or the last turn before the main straight) and gunned it trying to get outside the 1 second zone to gain an extra advantage. And he made that and won the freakin race starting in 19th position! Wow!

This is the furthest any driver at Monza has ever come to take victory. Only 1 other time in the history of F1 has a driver ever come through the field like Antonelli did today; John Watson come from 22nd position on the grid to win the 1983 United States Grand Prix West (at Long Beach).

This is also special for Italy as a whole, as today was the first Italian born winner of the Italian Grand prix since Ludovico Scarfiotti won 60 years ago in 1966. Wow! This is historic stuff!

Watching the post race interviews and trophy presentations and champaigne pouring is always eventful in Monza, but whenever Ferrari wins or in this case an Italian wins it's crazy special and the fans were wall to wall singing the national anthem and Kimi's name too! Really special race! I'll remember this one.

This is also the race that IMO likely puts the Championship on Auto-pilot, as Kimi Antonelli now holds a 66 point lead in the Championship with only 9 races to go! Wow! On a day most (especially his top competitors) thought Antonielli would be in damage limitation mode, he ends up freakin winning! Incredible! Congratulations! You have to be super impressed with this young man!

On to Spain next week! I believe it will be the first running at this particular track in Madrid, so should be somewhat of an unknown to the teams and drivers. Should be interesting!

13 hours ago, theguru said:

This is true and impressive and I like Yuki. But if I'm 100% objective, he lined up in the wrong position on the restart and should have been penalized for that because the entire field had to take a new warm up lap. But hey, I'm splitting hairs as far as who wins the race.