Lewis Hamilton was fastest in the second practice for the Italian Grand Prix going just over a quarter of a second faster than his teammate Valtteri Bottas. Mercedes looked to be in a strong position as there nearest opposition McLaren’s Lando Norris was more than half a second off in third.
Mercedes were always expected to be the team to beat, and it appears that they have managed to maintain that advantage. Norris finished third after Daniel Ricciardo’s fastest lap was deleted for exceeding track limits, which dropped the Renault driver to fifteenth.
The Englishman set his fastest time in the final minutes of the session which saw him leap up the timesheets, but the next lap was faster however like Ricciardo Norris ran wide leading to his lap time also being deleted.
Alpha Tauri continued their strong start to the weekend with Pierre Gasly going fourth fastest ahead of Red Bull’s Max Verstappen. Gasly had at one point gone fastest early on, before having a moment at the second chicane dipping his tyres on to the gravel.
The pace shown by Ricciardo, Norris and Gasly looks to show that the battle for best of the rest this weekend is going to be a close fight. But one where they need to be careful as their fastest laps were all deleted for track limits, they could have been third, fourth and fifth potentially.
There was a long list of drivers who had times deleted or have been warned about going too slowly on out laps. From FP3, the teams have been warned that the FIA will use a benchmark time to determine if drivers have toured too slowly ahead of their flying laps to avoid a repeat of such traffic, which blighted the end of Q3 at the same event in 2019.
Carlos Sainz did, however, finish sixth behind Verstappen, the McLaren driver was nine-tenths behind the Red Bull. Sainz was five-hundredths faster than Daniil Kvyat, the Russian leading Lance Stroll, Charles Leclerc and Sergio Perez.
Ferrari woes continued while Leclerc was ninth and two tenths faster than teammate Sebastian Vettel, the car is proving difficult to drive they both went off. Leclerc spinning into the grave as the car snapped through the first Lesmo.
Vettel’s moment saw him spin in front of Ricciardo, with him luck to avoid the barriers. The four-time champion then switched to long runs. Esteban Ocon ended the session just ahead of Vettel, by three-hundredths.
Alfa Romeo’s Antonio Giovinazzi was thirteenth, half a hundredth behind Vettel and ahead of the second Red Bull of Alex Albon. The Red Bull driver couldn’t improve on his 21.8 set early in the session when he went fastest.
Daniel Ricciardo was fifteenth fastest going eight thousandths faster than the Haas of Kevin Magnussen. Ferrari power really struggling as the occupied three of the bottom five positions, with Kimi Raikkonen seventeenth and Romain Grosjean eighteenth.
The two Williams were slowest of all, Nicholas Latifti nineteenth just over a tenth faster than George Russell.
