Formula 1 News: Verstappen schools both McLaren drivers to win Italian GP

Max Verstappen, driving the inferior Red Bull RB21, took Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri in the superior McLaren cars to school to win the 2025 Italian GP at Monza.

–by Mark Cipolloni–

Verstappen took the lead at the start from pole, voluntarily gave the lead to Lando Norris on lap 1, and then gave the British driver a schooling he won’t soon forget on lap 4. Once past, he then motored away to win by over 19 seconds over Norris.

It was Verstappen’s third win of the year (following Japan and Imola), and his third win at Monza in the last four years. It was also his 66th career F1 win.

“A great day for us. Lap 1 was a bit unlucky but after that we were flying,” said Verstappen.

“The car was really enjoyable, I could manage the pace and we pitted at the right time. Just fantastic execution by everyone.

“Step by step, race by race, we are trying to get better, but this was for us an unbelievable weekend.”

Not only did Verstappen turn the fastest lap in Formula 1 history in qualifying, he ran the fastest Formula 1 race in history (155.791 mph), breaking a record that was held by Michael Schumacher.

“I tried to keep it even on the braking into Turn 1, I always know it is going to be a good fight with Max and it was,” said a defeated Norris. “One of those weekends were we are a bit slower but a good fight and I enjoyed it.

“No idea what happened [with the pit stop] but I guess every now and then we make mistakes as a team, and today was one of them.

“I did everything I could today, I couldn’t do a lot more. I tried to fight with Max, but he came out on top and deserved it.”

Points leader Oscar Piastri fell on his sword and moved over to let Lando Norris finish 2nd after Norris lost 2nd with a long pitstop. Piastri ended up third to complete the podium.

“Difficult start, maybe not my best couple of laps,” said Piastri. Once I got past, a pretty lonely race from there. Happy with the points, I’ll take it.

“We were staying out for Safety Cars if there were any, but Max got back into our pit window and the little incident at the end but it is okay.

“Plenty to learn, happy going forward, and we’ll try and be better next weekend.”

Charles Leclerc brought his #16 Ferrari home in 4th while George Russell rounded out the top-5 for Mercedes ahead of Lewis Hamilton’s #44 Ferrari in 6th.

Despite getting beat by his teammate again, Hamilton had a good race, making decent progress and clearly having a lot of pace in the opening stages. His charge stalled once he got to the back of Russell, but sixth from P10 on the grid is expected given he had a superior car to the four cars he passed.

Alex Albon was 7th, Gabriel Bortoleto was eighth, Kimi Antonelli held onto ninth and Isack Hadjar was 10th after starting from the pit lane.

Red Bull’s low downforce package clearly works in the hands of Verstappen (his teammate was nowhere), and that bodes well for Las Vegas later this season.

Aston Martin at one point had both cars in the points-paying positions, but their afternoon turned sour with a late slump for Stroll and right-front suspension failure for Fernando Alonso, while Sauber’s Nico Hulkenberg failed to start due to a hydraulics problem.

They got beat by the greatest driver in F1 history, but McLaren at least scooped up plenty of points as they seek to close out the Teams’ Championship at the earliest possible opportunity.

And in the drivers’, Norris closed the gap at the top to 31 points.

After a double-header of races to start the second half of the season, the F1 circus gets a well earned weekend off next week. But then it is all systems go again for Baku, as Azerbaijan hosts the next round.

2025 Italian GP at Monza Results: 53 Laps