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Formula 1 Italian GP

F1 Italian GP Live Commentary and Updates - FP2 and Sprint

Saturday's action from Monza, including F1's second sprint event

Lando Norris, McLaren MCL35M, Pierre Gasly, AlphaTauri AT02

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Almost all the drivers, have now returned to the track, while the Ferrari garage is being all boarded up to hide the repair work going on.
That red flag disrupted a number of teams' long runs and now there's just 20 minutes to go - but no-one is rushing to get back out
The Ferrari is now all cleared up and the session gets back under way.
Alex adds: "I noticed the Ferraris generally looked a bit less stable than the rest all session through the second apex (which Sainz never got to). Not loose, just less poised. Leclerc was the same."
That crash happened right in front of our man on the Monza ground, ALEX KALINAUCKAS. Here's one of the pics he managed to get.

 

The Ferrari is now on the back of a flatbed truck on its way back to the pitlane.
This is now Sainz's third crash in the past four weekends. There's still four hours before the sprint race begins but there's a lot of work for Ferrari to do.
Replays show him losing the back end of the car as he accelerates out of the first part of Ascari and is speared directly into the barriers. Quite a big crash and Sainz now heads into the medical car.
"Are you OK?" the team asks. "That hurt a bit, but I'm OK," comes the weary response.
There's a lot of damage to the front of the Ferrari after an impact through the Ascari chicane. "I've had a massive crash," he says on the radio - it's an unusual place for one of those.
And now we've got a red flag - there's been a shunt for Sainz and he's stranded in the middle of the track!
Latifi, fresh from confirmation he will be staying at Williams next year, has now gone fourth on the medium tyres. But, as mentioned earlier, the times in this session are largely meaningless.
The slow-mo replay focuses in on Verstappen's soft tyres and there's some fairly significant graining on those.
Bottas is currently on a long run on his hard rubber and is told "the pace is looking good".
"A friendly heads up at Turn 11, Max," Verstappen is told over the radio. "What does that mean?" justifiably asks Verstappen. He's told it was close to the limit - isn't that what all drivers should be doing, though?
Russell now goes sixth but there's still a host of drivers that haven't really set representative times.
Bottas is the lastest one to mess up the Roggia chicane - and really crunches over the bumps, could be some floor damage after that.
Verstappen goes three tenths quicker on his second flying lap on these softs, setting the absolute fastest time in the final sector.
Alonso has just completed a lap on medium tyres and that means everyone has now set at least one time - almost 20 minutes into the session.
Verstappen now joins his team-mate at the top and goes fractionally faster - two tenths quicker than Perez.
Hamilton's first time on the softs puts his third, seven tenths behind current pacesetter Perez. Worth noting that Bottas' time for pole yesterday was a  1m19.555s - some four seconds faster than the current pace.
There's a real mix of different tyre compounds being used at the moment - the Aston Martins and Bottas are on the hards, while the rest are split between the softs and mediums.
But, despite that tow, Perez ends up going a tenth slower than his previous best, while Tsunoda now goes third.
Perez is getting a fantastic tow right under the gearbox of Norris down the pit straight and passes the McLaren into Turn 1. Will be interesting to see what impact the slipstream has on his lap time.
Gasly now heads up to second, two tenths down on Perez, as Mazepin retains third for Haas as things stand.
McLaren's Daniel Ricciardo has just headed out of the pits and instantly locked up into the first chicane and had to cut part of the corner, bouncing over the sleeping policeman kerbs
But, just as we type that, Hamilton does indeed now leave the pits!
Still no sign of the Mercedes, Alpines, Verstappen or Russell in this session just yet.
Finally the Haas drivers have been knocked off top spot by Sergio Perez's Red Bull, who sets a 1m24.870s to go a second quicker.
Schumacher just has a massive lock-up heading into the Roggia chicane and is forced down the escape road.
Giovinazzi is the latest to set a time and he falls into that tiny gap between the two Haas drivers' times.
But that's quickly beaten by just 0.089 seconds by his Haas team-mate Mazepin.
Schumacher is the only driver to come round and set a time and it's a 1m27.463s
Alonso and Gasly are two of the drivers not yet even in their cars - so it will be a slow start to this session for some
Norris, Stroll and Tsunoda now join those heading out - but it's not the same rush as there was in FP1 yesterday
The two Haas drivers, Vettel and Latifi are the four cars to instantly head out on to the Monza track.
Clearly things are all relaxed at Red Bull - the TV replays show Verstappen fooling around with his mechanics!
As a weather update, it's currently sunny and 24 degrees in Monza for the start of this session
As a reminder, it is once again Robert Kubica who is driving for Alfa Romeo this weekend, following a positive COVID-19 test for Kimi Raikkonen.

By: autosport.com staff

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