Five themes to watch for in Italy
Can anyone stop Vettel on Sunday? Will the Monza race be a slipstreaming classic thanks to the DRS zones? And is blistering going to be a problem again? Edd Straw runs over the talking points after qualifying
Unbeatable Vettel?
Monza is Red Bull's bogey track; far more so than Spa ever was, as Mark Webber admitted in the build-up to the weekend. Yet somehow, Sebastian Vettel has done it again and made it 13 pole positions for Red Bull out of 13 races. Not only that, but he was almost half-a-second clear of second-placed Lewis Hamilton. And all this despite being 4km/h off the bottom of the rankings in the main speed trap (located at the end of the main straight). That means, slower than everyone. The deficit to fastest man Sergio Perez in that speed trap was a mighty 21.5km/h.
So that means he's a sitting duck in the race, right? Not necessarily. While Vettel is sitting on the rev limiter longer than the rest, he's also carrying great speed out of the Parabolica and onto the main straight. That means that it's no foregone conclusion that he is going to be passed left right and centre.
Share Or Save This Story
Subscribe and access Autosport.com with your ad-blocker.
From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.