Kimi Antonelli went from 19th to 1st as he charged through the field to become the first Italian winner at Monza since 1966.
Pierre Gasly would be happy with his first start from pole position, as he was able to get a good launch from the grid and maintained the lead of the race coming out of the first chicane.
Ferrari though didn’t have the best of starts, with Leclerc and Hamilton squabbling for 3rd going into turn 1, with Hamilton then being pushed wide onto the gravel by his teammate on the exit of the chicane, causing him to drop down the field a bit.
Gasly would remain in 1st for the rest of the opening lap, but Russell was hot on his heels, and managed to take the lead from the Alpine driver at the start of lap 2. Gasly would briefly drop down to 3rd as Leclerc followed Russell through, but Gasly would be able to retake 2nd heading into Variante della Roggia.
Leclerc’s race would prematurely end at the end of lap 2, as he would have a major crash at Parabolica, as his car would lose grip after going onto the white lines on the outside of the circuit indicating track limits. The nature of the crash and the amount of repairs needed on the barrier resulted in a red flag coming out.
Russell was able to get a good launch at the race restart, maintaining the lead into turn 1 despite Gasly getting a good run himself. Colapinto behind was able to briefly climb up to 3rd place, but would almost lose his car and went wide at the 1st lesmo, dropping all the way down to 16th.
Hamilton was able to recover from what was initially a bad start, climbing up to 4th after a short battle with Piastri, all the while Antonelli was able to already climb up to 6th after having started towards the back of the grid.
Russell would quickly create a gap of over 1 second to Pierre Gasly, denying the Alpine driver from having extra battery boost, which opened the door for Verstappen to make his way up to 2nd.
Gasly would continue to drop down the field, and the already faint hopes of possibly getting a win, or at the very least the podium, were fading rapidly, having already fell to 6th by lap 11.
Verstappen was flying around the circuit in the early laps of the restart, and was able to take the lead from Russell on lap 12, despite the latter looking to try and defend the position.
By lap 13, Antonelli was already up to 3rd place, and with Russell and Verstappen continuing to squabble, it was already looking likely that the championship leader was well in contention for a win at his home race.
Mercedes would eventually put themselves in the top 2 places, after Russell would overtake Verstappen for first place, while Antonelli would do the same thing to claim 2nd just one lap later.
Antonelli would bring himself up to 1st by lap 18 after overtaking Russell down the start-finish straight, but the development of the race up to this point was showing that no one in that lead pack had enough overwhelming pace to break away and create a controlling lead, meaning that first place was still not secure for the time being.
This fact was shown on lap 20, as Russell was able to briefly take the lead, before losing it to Antonelli just a moment later, though by this point it seemed that Verstappen was beginning to fall back, possibly making the win a two way fight.
Mercedes were starting to get nervous about their drivers to stop the yo-yo style racing due to the risk of a crash rising, though Verstappen was managing to close the gap to the leaders from the moment they stopped swapping positions, bringing him back into contention for the race win.
A Virtual Safety Car was brought out on lap 28 as Lance Stroll’s car lost power, which created an opportunity for Antonelli to pit, taking off his medium tyres, while Russell on his hard tyres would stay out, despite being in the lead and usually getting priority in terms of a pit stop. Verstappen would join Antonelli in the pit lane
While Antonelli and Verstappen would have better tyres, they came back out behind some traffic in 6th and 7th place respectively, and would need to navigate through that as they looked to close down the 15 second gap to Russell if they wanted any chance of winning the race.
Antonelli was proving to make swift work of climbing back up the field, having gotten up to 4th by lap 31, while Verstappen was having a tougher time of things, and would start to get held up behind the McLaren of Lando Norris, losing a couple of seconds in the process.
Antonelli would be back in the podium places on lap 35, overtaking Hamilton after the Ferrari driver locked up going into turn 1 and having to use the escape road. Now, Antonelli was just under 10 seconds away from the lead, albeit with just 18 laps remaining.
Antonelli would then take 2nd place on lap 37, now just under 9 seconds away from the lead. Behind, Verstappen was able to also claim another position after overtaking Hamilton for 4th on the same lap.
A few laps later Verstappen was able to climb up to 3rd, but did not have the pace advantage that Antonelli in the Mercedes did, and Piastri was able to stick with the 4 time world champion before regaining the position on lap 41. Verstappen would regain 3rd on lap 43, and this time would make it stick.
Antonelli was able to finally get the opportunity to overtake his teammate for the lead on lap 49, and while Russell went deep in his defence, Antonelli went wide as the track provided no grip on the outside of the first chicane, the tarmac having broken up over the course of the race.
The mistake would not cost Antonelli for long, as the Italian would make the deciding overtake just one lap later, breezing past his teammate on the way down the Ascari chicane as he went on to become the first Italian driver to win his home race in 60 years, the last being Ludovico Scarfiotti at the 1966 Italian Grand Prix.
The result means that Antonelli now stretches his championship lead to 66 points over George Russell ahead of the Spanish Grand Prix next week, which will take place at the all new street circuit in Madrid called the Madring.
