| 2021 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Race 2 of 22[a] in the2021 Formula One World Championship
| |||||
 Layout of the Autodromo Internazionale Enzo e Dino Ferrari | |||||
| Race details | |||||
| Date | 18 April 2021 | ||||
| Official name | Formula 1 PirelliGran Premio del Made in Italy e dell'Emilia Romagna 2021 | ||||
| Location | Autodromo Internazionale Enzo e Dino Ferrari,Imola,Emilia-Romagna, Italy | ||||
| Course | Permanent racing facility | ||||
| Course length | 4.909 km (3.050 miles) | ||||
| Distance | 63 laps, 309.049 km (192.034 miles) | ||||
| Weather | Wet at start, drying during race, 9 °C (48 °F) | ||||
| Attendance | 0[b] | ||||
| Pole position | |||||
| Driver | Mercedes | ||||
| Time | 1:14.411 | ||||
| Fastest lap | |||||
| Driver |  Lewis Hamilton | Mercedes | |||
| Time | 1:16.702 on lap 60 | ||||
| Podium | |||||
| First | Red Bull Racing-Honda | ||||
| Second | Mercedes | ||||
| Third | McLaren-Mercedes | ||||
Lap leaders | |||||
The2021 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix (officially known as theFormula 1 Pirelli Gran Premio del Made in Italy e dell'Emilia Romagna 2021) was aFormula Onemotor race which took place on 18 April 2021 at theAutodromo Internazionale Enzo e Dino Ferrari inImola, Italy. The race, held in wet conditions, was the second round of the2021 Formula One World Championship, and the secondEmilia Romagna Grand Prix.
Lewis Hamilton, who led thedriver's championship, started from pole position, but he was overtaken at the first corner byMax Verstappen ofRed Bull Racing, who led the rest of the race and claimed victory. Hamilton managed to recover from a minor crash to take second place for theMercedes team, just ahead of theMcLaren ofLando Norris. The race was temporarily stopped halfway through after a high-speed crash involvingValtteri Bottas andGeorge Russell.
The race was the second round of the2021 Formula One World Championship, and the second running of theEmilia Romagna Grand Prix. It was the twenty-ninth time Imola hosted a Formula One race, having previously hosted 26 editions of theSan Marino Grand Prix and the1980 Italian Grand Prix.[2] Unlike the 2020 edition (which took place over two days),[3] this event utilised the traditional three-day format.[2]
The drivers and teams were the same as the season entry list with no additional stand-in drivers for the race.[4] Tyre supplierPirelli brought theC2, C3 and C4 tyre compounds (designated hard, medium and soft respectively) for teams to use at the event.[5]
In March 2021, organisers announced that the race would be heldbehind closed doors due to theCOVID-19 pandemic in Italy.[6] TheDRS zone located on the main straight would be longer than the previous edition of the race, to aid overtaking. The detection point was moved from the exit of the second Rivazza (turn 18) to the entrance of the said turn (turn 17).[7]
Lewis Hamilton entered the weekend as both thedefending race winner and the championship leader, with a seven-point lead overMax Verstappen ofRed Bull Racing. Verstappen was considered the favourite to win the race, ahead of Hamilton and his teammate,Valtteri Bottas.[8] Some teams had new parts on their cars for the first European race of the year, with Ferrari and Williams using their versions of the "z-shaped" floors Mercedes and Red Bull had utilised in Bahrain.[9]
There were three practice sessions, all an hour in length. The first practice session started at 11:00 local time (UTC+02:00) on Friday 16 April. The second practice session started at 14:30 local time on the same afternoon and the final practice session started at 11:00 on Saturday.[10]
The first practice session ended with Bottas fastest ahead of Hamilton and Verstappen. The session wasred flagged twice, the first time following a collision between Red Bull'sSergio Pérez andAlpine'sEsteban Ocon at turns five and six, and a second time whenNikita Mazepin crashed at turn 18.[11] The second practice session ended with Bottas fastest ahead of Hamilton andPierre Gasly, driving forAlphaTauri. The session was interrupted twice, the first time when Verstappen stopped on track, resulting in thevirtual safety car being deployed, and a second time whenCharles Leclerc crashed his Ferrari, at the end of the session, bringing out the red flag.[12] The final practice session ended with Verstappen fastest ahead of theMcLaren ofLando Norris and Hamilton.[13]
The time of the qualifying session was moved to avoid a clash with thefuneral of Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, who died on 9 April; as a result the start times for the practice sessions were also adjusted.[14] Before the start of qualifying, at 14:00 local time (UTC+02:00), there was a minute's silence to mark the Prince's death.[10][14] The first part of qualifying (Q1) was red-flagged afterYuki Tsunoda spun and crashed heavily at the Variente Alta chicane.[15] As only five drivers had set a time before Tsunoda's crash, the track was noticeably congested near the end of the session; In addition to Tsunoda, the eliminated drivers included both theAlfa Romeos ofKimi Raikkonen andAntonio Giovinazzi, and both theHaas cars ofMick Schumacher andNikita Mazepin.[16] Giovinazzi later issued a public criticism of Mazepin, who had overtaken the Italian driver on his last lap, forcing its abandonment.[17] The second part of qualifying (Q2) was less eventful, but saw the surprise elimination of theFerrari ofCarlos Sainz Jr., who only managed eleventh place. Behind the Spaniard wasGeorge Russell,Sebastian Vettel, Russell's teammateNicholas Latifi, andFernando Alonso.[16]Sergio Pérez topped the session, ahead of theMcLaren ofLando Norris, who had performed impressively all weekend.[18]
Lewis Hamilton took pole position for the 99th time in the final part of qualifying, just ahead of theRed Bull of Pérez, who confessed that he had lost time at the Rivazza double left-hander.[19] Norris would have started on the front row for the first time in his career, had he not breached track limits at the fast Piratella curve, leading to his time being deleted; he started seventh.[15] Pérez's teammateMax Verstappen thus qualified third, less than a tenth of a second behind Hamilton, whileCharles Leclerc managed to take fourth place in the session.[20] Behind them,Pierre Gasly andDaniel Ricciardo qualified fifth and sixth, while Hamilton's teammateValtteri Bottas experienced a torrid session; having been first in Q1, he only managed eighth in Q3.[16] The top ten was rounded out byEsteban Ocon andLance Stroll, the latter of whom did not set a lap during the session.[15]
The race started at 15:00 local time (UTC+02:00) and was held over 63 laps.[10] Heavy rain had fallen before the race, and on his way to the grid,Fernando Alonso lost control and hit the wall at Tosa; he managed to drive to the grid, where theAlpine mechanics were able to fix the damage.[25][26]Sebastian Vettel had to start from the pitlane after his brakes overheated before the race, and was given a ten-second penalty when the team failed to fit his car's tyres before the five-minute deadline.[27]Charles Leclerc was able to recover from a spin on the formation lap and start the race.[28]
At the race start,Max Verstappen bolted off the line and managed to overtake both his teammateSergio Pérez and polesitterLewis Hamilton to take the lead; Hamilton was forced to drive over the kerbs on the outside of the Tamburello curve, which damaged his front wing.[25] On the run up to the Variante Alta chicane,Nikita Mazepin was unable to avoid theWilliams ofNicholas Latifi, who had run wide at the Acque Minerali right-hander; Mazepin'sHaas emerged undamaged, but Latifi was spun into the wall, ending his race.[29] During the resulting safety car,Mick Schumacher spun near the pit exit and lost his front wing, while Perez, after running into the gravel, illegally regained his position, an action which gained him a ten-second stop-go penalty.[30][31] With the rain gradually ceasing, Vettel was the first driver to change onto slick tyres, which he did on lap 22. Verstappen, leading by just over a second from Hamilton, pitted on lap 27 for slicks; Hamilton, seeking to utilise theovercut, looked to be neck-and-neck with his rival when he came into the pits the next lap, but a comparatively slow pitstop dropped him back behind Verstappen.
On the thirty-first lap, Hamilton slid into the gravel at Tosa, while trying to lap the Williams ofGeorge Russell.[32] He managed to stop his car clear of the barriers, but drove directly into the barriers while trying to rejoin the race, damaging his front wing.[33] Soon after, Russell was involved in a 320 kilometres per hour (200 mph) crash with the otherMercedes ofValtteri Bottas, at the entrance to the fast Tamburello chicane; the race was red-flagged because debris had scattered across the track.[34] Both drivers were noticeably enraged following the incident - Russell marched over to the remains of Bottas' Mercedes to confront him, while Bottas replied to a light slap on his crash helmet from Russell by giving him themiddle finger.[32] Because the stewards classified the incident as a racing incident, neither driver was penalised.[35]
Just before the restart, Verstappen almost spun at Rivazza, but managed to maintain control; he kept the lead and pulled away for the rest of the race.[30] Behind him,Lando Norris overtook theFerrari ofCharles Leclerc for second place, while Perez andYuki Tsunoda spun at Villeneuve and Tamburello respectively, dropping them down to 14th and 15th.[28] Hamilton, starting ninth after the red flag, worked his way upwards through the field, and eventually managed to pass the stubbornMcLaren of Norris for second place on lap 60.[32] Norris achieved his second podium with third-place, following an equal placing atAustria the previous year. Hamilton claimed the bonus point for fastest lap, allowing him to maintain the lead in the championship over Verstappen.[36]
Toto Wolff expressed displeasure with both Bottas and Russell following the race, but remarked he had expected Russell, a member of theMercedes Junior Team, to be more circumspect while overtaking a Mercedes.[37] Bottas had sustained a bruised knee in the 30g (290 m/s2; 970 ft/s2) crash, and Wolff was also irritated that his car had been almost completely wrecked.[38] The following day Russell expressed his desire to "clear the air" with Bottas following the confrontation, and later apologised to Bottas and to the Williams team.[39][40]Lance Stroll was later given a five-second time penalty for cutting the Tamburello chicane, dropping him from seventh to eighth-position.[41]Kimi Räikkönen was given a thirty-second penalty after he breached the restart rules, dropping him from ninth place to thirteenth.[42] Räikkönen's team appealed the penalty, it was upheld following a review.[43]
|
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Previous race: 2021 Bahrain Grand Prix | FIA Formula One World Championship 2021 season | Next race: 2021 Portuguese Grand Prix |
| Previous race: 2020 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix | Emilia Romagna Grand Prix | Next race: 2022 Emilia Romagna Grand Prix |
