Sainz is excited about the Italian GP ahead of pole position and Alonso hides his cards

On the day of his 29th birthday, Carlos Sainz gave himself a great present by completing a great first day of work at the 2023 F1 Italian GP at the wheel of his Ferrari SF23. The Madrid driver achieved the best time of the day by leading the second free practice session at Monza, filling the faithful ‘tifosi’ with hope, that the stands of the Italian track have not yet been filled, but who can this Saturday dreaming of a Spanish or Leclerc pole ahead of the mighty Max Verstappen. The Dutchman is still favourite, he got it. But attention to Ferrari. It was already seen coming that the Italians could be very strong at Monza, especially in a corner. AND Carlos Sainz is in charge not only of confirming it on the first day, for someone with great authority to also present his candidacy for pole position in front of the transalpine fans.

It’s no secret that Carlos is like a fish out of water on this track. In 2020, he came close to winning with McLaren in a breathtaking finish. And last year left bittersweet. ran, with an amazing comeback worthy of a podium. But his starting position, from 18th place, due to an engine change, prevented him from stepping on the podium. He went from 18th to 4th in just 13 laps and a final ‘safety’ clipped his wings. Now, a year later, find glory to celebrate something big this weekend, a perfect gift to yourself for his birthday.

The man from Madrid did not hide that he felt a special ‘feeling’ in this layout. And he proved it from the start, showing himself to be faster than his teammate Leclerc, who, however, always gets something extra from the ‘worthy’. It will be necessary to see if the Monegasque achieves this now also in Q3, but for now, this Friday Sainz started day 2 in Free Practice 1 close to Max and led FP1 with 19 thousandths of a margin over Norris, 0″185 over Pérez (3rd), 0″190 over Piastri (4th) and 0″276 ahead of Verstappen, the favorite.

In addition, the Spaniard’s time was on his second attempt on his wheels, as he had to abort the first after setting the record in the first sector. Carlos flew, but doing so on Friday was useless. He will need to do it now when it really matters, on real fire, to aim to beat Verstappen.

Dutch time should be taken with a grain of salt. He ran into traffic in the second sector of his lap attempt. He asked to try again, and he didn’t want to lose even the free ones. “Max, this is not the ranking”they remind him. Like a child who wants to continue playing, he repeated his request to have a “more correct reading” of his turn and what he should do this Saturday. But they again denied it, a sign that Red Bull didn’t need to see more than they did to go into pole position today.

Pérez, on gravel

Pérez had more trouble, with 9 minutes to go on the gravel in the famous Parabolica final. The Mexican needs to regain confidence this Saturday in a ‘qualy’ that seems to have been touched by the amount of slipstreams that will try to be given between teammates and by track and traffic limitations. There could be trouble and Sainz could fight it all.

Ferrari, all or nothing: much is at stake at Monza

Ferrari knew that if it could secure pole position and a victory on Sunday, it would have saved its poor season in front of its fans. His sins will be forgiven thinking that it is already 2024. To do this, in the paddock it is rumored that Ferrari has mounted a new, somewhat more powerful engine. His car is very fast in a corner and Sainz and Leclerc will test it this Saturday. The doubt lies in the pace of the race, where Max is always crushed as the Ferrari sinks. However, this is the first time this season that someone from Ferrari has been heard dreaming of victory in a race. MD heard this before the red hospitality, although he knew that Verstappen must be at fault. It’s their dream.

Alonso is hiding

One of the big doubts left on the first day of practice for the Italian F1 GP was Aston Martin’s performance. Due to the fact that this Saturday’s classification was in an experimental format, with the mandatory use of hard tires in Q1, the medium in Q2 and the soft in Q3, this made time comparison difficult. and everyone tried to save the wheels. This is the clear example of Fernando Alonso, who only used soft rubber to perform a ‘qualification’ simulation earlier than his rivals, and then worked on the race simulation to understand if the soft rubber (a point softer than last year ) is either a valid option for the race or else it won’t work.

After FP1 where Alonso focused on evaluating the performance of the new specific rear wing brought in for Monza, in Free Practice 2 the Aston Marton program was affected by the problem of lack of electricity in Stroll’s car in the first minutes. The green team was left without an important tire comparison between their two cars and could only run with Alonso, an important point they had to try to reverse their work in Free Practice 3. Alonso finished 8th at 0.716 after 6 in the morning. Parity is highest and there is only 0.9 between 1st and 10th and 3 tenths between 7th and 10th.