How McLaren was outwitted by a wily Ferrari F1 team at Monza

Utilising its car’s easiness on the front tyres, Ferrari used strategy to help Charles Leclerc deliver a home victory at Monza. Stopping only once, he gained track position over the two McLarens as Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris made their second stops. The grip boost of their faster, newer tyres was not enough to allow them to catch Leclerc who was 2.6sec ahead of Piastri at the flag.

A new track surface and the easing of some key kerbs had made Monza faster. So much so that the front tyres were being pushed hard enough that they were tending to grain. Practices suggested the graining was serious enough that a two-stop strategy would be quicker than stopping only once.

In the first stint the McLaren drivers – with Piastri leading and Norris third behind Leclerc – had no reason to change that view. In response to McLaren bringing in Norris, Ferrari took action on the next lap with Leclerc – but Norris undercut past him anyway. “What was that?” a bewildered Leclerc asked over the radio. “We came in early but still got undercut.”

But actually it worked brilliantly well for him in hindsight. Because without any undercut pressure from behind he was able to gamble on an alternative one-stop strategy with no downside. Even if it didn’t work, he’d be third, which is where he looked set to finish if he just emulated the two-stop McLaren strategy.

Because the Ferrari was easier on its front tyres than the McLaren, there was less graining. Leclerc, running at a very similar pace to the McLarens but
a few seconds behind, found that once he wore off the graining there was still plenty of tread left and the tyres were still good. Piastri, meanwhile, upon being asked if he thought he might be able to get through to the end without stopping again, replied in the negative. Norris locked up on his worn tyres and ran straight-on through the Roggia chicane run-off area – and this was the cue to bring him in for fresh rubber. Piastri was brought in shortly afterwards.

Now in clear air, Leclerc found the Ferrari was behaving beautifully and he committed fully now to the one-stop.

“In hindsight, yes,” answered Piastri to the question of whether he should have stayed out. “But, you know, everyone’s a legend [afterwards] and, unfortunately, we got it a bit wrong today – myself being a big part of that. We had everything to lose from being in the lead of the race whereas Charles was able to try something a bit different. Even if it didn’t work out he’d still be in third position. He picked the right gamble.

“The graining of the tyres has been a big topic all weekend. In practice, once you got graining, it was basically game over. Even in the first stint on the mediums, it was difficult and when we made the second stop, my front left tyre was pretty heavily grained and, you know, I was going slower and slower. So it seemed like a sensible decision to pit again.”