2024 Formula 1 Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix Highlights

Max Verstappen has returned to winning ways after missing out in Miami by taking victory in the 2024 Formula 1 Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix, with the Dutchman holding off an exciting late charge from Lando Norris.

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Mario Isola, Motorsport Director, Pirelli:

It was a close race, mostly, without any exhilarating moments, but it livened up towards the end as Norris closed on Verstappen. On an old-style track like Imola, overtaking has always been difficult, and this year was no exception. As predicted, a strategy based on a single stop was the quickest and was adopted by the majority, with the first stint run on the Medium and the second with the Hard. Both compounds worked quite well even though, especially at the front of the field, the drivers pushed practically all race long, with track temperatures oscillating between 43 and 50 °C, even if there were a few clouds overhead.

The predicted pit stop window proved accurate: those who stopped very early then found themselves struggling towards the end. Degradation was not very high because there were few signs of graining.

Let’s not forget the incredible atmosphere created by the passionate crowd at Imola. Their unwavering support and enthusiasm added an extra layer of excitement to the race, making it a memorable experience for the drivers and teams.

The day on the track:

Fifteen drivers lined up for the start on the Medium tyre. Three, Perez, Sargeant and Zhou opted for the Hard, while Alonso, starting from pit lane and Gasly, took a gamble on the Soft. As widely predicted, it was a one-stop race, with Medium and Hard as the favourite choices. Starting on the Softs did not pay off, and both drivers had to make an additional stop. With three laps to go, Aston Martin’s Spanish driver fitted another set of Softs, probably to set the fastest race lap, but this went to George Russell, who also made an extra stop on lap 52 with this in mind, thus bringing Mercedes the extra point.

The prize for the longest stint goes to Valtteri Bottas (Sauber), who is no stranger to this exercise. He completed 54 of his 62 laps on the C3, while Kevin Magnussen (Haas) and Lance Stroll (Aston Martin) topped the laps on the C4, extending the first stint to lap 37.

What’s next?

The European leg of the Formula 1 season is back in action immediately next week with another classic event, the Monaco Grand Prix. As in Imola, the two junior categories, Formula 2 and Formula 3, will also race on the streets of Monte Carlo.

2024 Formula 1 Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix Race Results

2024 Constructor Standings

Here are the team-by-team highlights:

Max Verstappen dug in for a brilliant Emilia Romagna Grand Prix victory on Sunday as he held off a late charge from McLaren’s Lando Norris with Mexican teammate Sergio Pérez eighth.

Verstappen started on pole position and cruised through the first two-thirds of the race before Norris started to make up time, leading to a nervous last lap where the Dutchman managed to hold his nerve.

Oracle Red Bull Racing’s Pérez started on hard tyres and ran into the gravel at Rivazza but recovered to bank eighth, while Japanese driver Tsunoda completed an encouraging weekend with a point in 10th.

Verstappen now holds a 48-point lead over Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, with Pérez 54 points back heading into the iconic Monaco Grand Prix next weekend.

Max Verstappen, Driver, Red Bull Racing

It was a close race today. I didn’t expect that the car would have that kind of pace at the beginning, which was nice, and we were strong on the medium tyres. When we swapped to the hard tyres, it was a bit trickier to drive and more of a struggle to bring it to an end as the tyres fell out of the operating window, and we had a really low grip. During the last 10 laps, I was really trying to survive on the tyres and managed to keep Lando behind, but it required a lot of focus as we were on the limit with the penalty. However, we managed to work through and take the win; I was definitely counting down the laps until the end, and it was a great feeling when we took the chequered flag! If you look at where we were at the beginning of the weekend, this was an extremely good result. There is a bit of work to do and things to analyse, but we are looking forward to Monaco.

Sergio Pérez, Driver, Red Bull Racing:

We knew it was going to be a hard day today as the whole weekend was compromised from qualifying. Imola is a difficult track to overtake on, so this was the maximum we could do today, especially since we were struggling with traffic in the beginning on my first stint and on the hard tyres, we had no margin to play around with the balance. We knew that McLaren was the fastest, but Max had one of the best weekends I’ve seen from him in a while, so a lot of praise for that and this was a great result for us. We have a few things we need to analyse and certainly some work to do as we head into the next race, but I’m looking forward to Monaco, and hopefully, we will continue our strong season and get some good momentum back.

JODY EGGINTON, Technical Director, Red Bull Racing

It’s nice to come away with a point from Yuki, but there’s also a slight feeling of frustration as we had the pace to possibly be further up the road at the end of the race. However, we lost places with both cars off the start, and that pushed us into making an earlier-than-planned stop to try and recover, meaning we had to go longer than we wanted on the second set of tyres. That opened up the opportunity for Stroll to go long with less traffic, and he took good advantage of this. On the positive side, the car and recent updates worked well here, and it’s been a fantastic effort from everyone at the factory supplying new parts. It was good to see so many of them here with us, celebrating in the grandstands after all their hard work.

Scuderia Ferrari HP came away from the Gran Premio del Made in Italy e dell’Emilia-Romagna with a third place for Charles Leclerc – a seventh podium in as many races for the team this season – and a fifth for Carlos Sainz. There were positives to take away from the event over and above the race result in itself because, over 63 laps of Imola, all the hard work in Maranello to fine-tune the updates package on the SF-24 was clear to see. It worked as expected, and the whole team put in a lot of effort to get everything out of the car. This intense work on all fronts meant the drivers were even more competitive in the race, as can be seen from the gap between Leclerc and the race winner, Max Verstappen and gave the team hope for the rest of the season. With such small gaps, the team now has to improve its qualifying performance because it was clear today that grid position had a profound effect on the final result. And that will be even more the case next week in Monaco.

The race. Almost predictably, the top three finished in the order in which they started. When the lights went out, Verstappen managed to fend off Lando Norris, Charles, Carlos and Oscar Piastri. The order remained unchanged up to the first run of pit stops, which Piastri initiated on lap 24. Carlos stayed out, deciding it would be difficult to defend from the undercut from the Australian and that the McLaren driver would have to deal with traffic. Sainz pitted on lap 27 when his Mediums started to go off and he had to defend from the Mercedes duo, but he was unable to stay ahead of the McLaren and had to settle for fifth. The gaps between the first three were very small throughout the second part of the race. Charles managed to close on Norris at the start of his stint on the Hard, but with such small differences between car performance at Imola, getting past was impossible. The Monegasque could match Verstappen’s pace, and so the gap to the Dutchman remained practically the same as it was at the pit stops, and then, towards the end, Norris pushed on more as he tried to fight for the win. Charles finished just under eight seconds behind the winner, while Carlos had a solitary time of it in the second part, able to match Piastri’s pace on the Hard but not to pass him, so he had to settle for fifth.

Standings. Charles’ third place brought him enough points to get ahead of Sergio Perez to go second in the standings, behind the leader Verstappen. Scuderia Ferrari HP also confirmed its second place in pursuit of Red Bull in the Constructors.’ In five days’ time, the action resumes in Monaco for Charles Leclerc’s home race, where the small matter of winning around the streets of Monte Carlo is something he is keen to deal with as soon as possible.

Carlos Sainz #55

I cannot be happy after what was a tough race for me. I need to review it with the team to understand why I’ve not been comfortable with the car both in qualifying and today, pace-wise.We will regroup tomorrow to start preparing for Monaco, and hopefully, we can get a better result there. The fight at the top is getting tight, and we need to continue pushing.

Charles Leclerc #16

Today’s race went well, and we got even closer to our rivals. If we had qualified higher, we could have presented our fans with an even better result. After changing to the Hard tyres, I had great pace and managed to make up ground on Lando (Norris) and Max (Verstappen), but in the end, the McLaren was quicker than us, although not by much.

Looking at the bigger picture, this race has given us plenty of reasons to be optimistic. The upgrades we implemented performed as expected, making us more competitive. We are determined to continue our work and close the gap, no matter how small, that separates us from the race winner.

Obviously, we dedicate this result and our performance to the Tifosi, who are the best fans in the world. They always support us, come what may. We’ll soon be able to pay them back with a win.

Frédéric Vasseur – Team Principal

First, I would like to thank all the Tifosi, as it was extraordinary to see them under the podium after the race. They brought us a lot of energy this week. Overall, it was a good weekend beyond the performance on track. Today, we got the best result we could, as it is tough to overtake here. We could close the gap when we were pushing, but we had to be careful about overheating the tyres, and we did not have enough pace difference to overtake. Unfortunately, the outcome of the Grand Prix was very much connected to yesterday’s qualifying, and we need to do a better job in the next races, as we can now see that our competitiveness in the race itself has improved. I think today’s race was also a perfect advert for Formula 1 as we saw three teams in seven seconds after more than 60 laps, which means the gaps are less than one-tenth per lap. We are definitely on the pace now, and we can fight for the top spot, even if we still need to make a small step forward.

Lewis Hamilton finished P6, with George Russell P7, at the 2024 Formula 1 Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix. Both drivers started on the Medium compound tyre, George lining up P6 with Lewis P8. Lewis made immediate progress, passing Tsunoda for P7. Our duo ran line astern and at a similar pace to the cars ahead for the opening 20 laps.

George began to see his Medium tyres dropping off and was the first of the top-10 to stop, switching to the Hard tyre on lap 21. Meanwhile, Lewis extended his opening stint and, after stopping for the Hard tyre on lap 27, ran a one-stop race to the end. Having pitted earlier than others, the team had some concerns about George’s Hard tyres making it to the end. He, therefore, made a precautionary stop for the used Medium tyre, dropping behind his team-mate, but then utilised it to take the fastest lap of the race point.

George Russell

We had some concerns over the Hard tyre being able to go to the end, so we made a second pit stop. Of course, that meant I lost a position to Lewis, but we were able to score one extra point as a team. It was quite a lonely race for us. We’ve slightly closed the gap to Red Bull and extended our advantage over the midfield. However, McLaren and Ferrari have also found similar gains, so we are aiming to bring more performance and bigger steps as soon as we can. We’re never going to be satisfied with P6 and P7, but this is where we are at the moment.

Everyone is super motivated and it’s very inspiring to see. Everyone at Brackley and Brixworth is working so hard to bring improvements, and it’s great to see. We’ve got to keep on pushing. This weekend, we maximised the package we had, and we will continue to aim to do that moving forward.

Lewis Hamilton

My race was generally good. I had one moment that cost me about five seconds, but my race pace was generally strong, so I’m happy with how it went. I made a good start, and that was important to get past Tsunoda. From there, I was able to extend my opening stint, and that helped me make the one-stop strategy work.

We’ve taken a small step forward this weekend, and we have improved. Unfortunately, that is slightly masked by the step forward others such as McLaren and Ferrari have taken. We will keep pushing to bring more updates that can add performance. Until then, we will make sure we are scoring as many points as we can.

Toto Wolff, Team Principal & CEO

It’s not possible to see it in terms of the result, but we have taken a small step forward this weekend. Our closest competitors have also done so recently, but we have closed the gap to the front a little. We still have a lot of work to do and of course, we are all frustrated finishing P6 and P7. There is more to come, though, and it is all about making incremental gains. These are what we need to keep delivering if we are to get ourselves in the fight with the three teams ahead of us.

With George’s second stop, our wear forecasts showed that he might struggle to make it last to the end of the race on the Hard tyre. We had the opportunity to pit and get out ahead of Perez and, therefore, opted to stop him. That also enabled us to go for the fastest lap point. It cost George a place to Lewis, but ultimately, the team was able to score an additional point.

Andrew Shovlin, Trackside Engineering Director

It’s clear we have made progress this weekend, but our nearest competitors are also pushing hard. The race today confirmed that we need to continue to make these gains to be in the fight with the top three teams. We are continuing to work on that, with the factory flat out on development. We will look to continue to bring updates to subsequent races.

Today, the Grand Prix didn’t give us any opportunities. There were no Virtual Safety Cars or Safety Cars, so as much as P6 and P7 are frustrating, they are what our pace deserved. We’re not lacking any determination or effort to improve, and over the last few weeks, it has been encouraging to see the efforts that every team member has put into the drive to get back to the front.

Hear from McLaren Formula 1 drivers Lando Norris, Oscar Piastri, and Team Principal Andrea Stella after the 2024 Formula 1 Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix.

 At lights out, Oscar moves up to P3 in the first corner. Lando drops one place. Oscar overtakes Leclerc on Lap 5 for P2. A loose bollard causes a Virtual Safety Car. Oscar moves into P1 and Lando P3 after various car boxes. Oscar boxes on Lap 28 for Hard tyres. Sainz follows him, promoting Lando to P1. A Safety Car is deployed on Lap 29 after an incident with Magnussen and Sargeant. Lando boxes for Hard tyres. The race restarts, and Lando holds P1. Oscar and Sainz fight for P4. There’s contact as Sainz overtakes Oscar. Oscar boxes on Lap 41. The team replace his front wing and swap to Medium tyres. Oscar fights his way from P19 to P13. Lando crosses the line in P1, winning his first-ever Grand Prix!

Lando Norris

Another great weekend for the team. I fought hard right until the very last lap, but we just lost out a little bit too much to Max in the beginning. One or two more laps and it would have been beautiful – but just wasn’t meant to be today.

“We’ve been competitive all weekend, and I think we’re at the point where we’re able to fight Ferrari and Red Bull consistently. We must get used to that – the team is doing a very good job , so it’s great that fighting at the front is now business as usual. We just need to keep focused on improving. It’s still a surprise to say it’s frustrating not to win, but after last weekend and the improvements we made, it’s what we should start to expect.

Oscar Piastri

P4, a good day, and I think that’s the most we could have done. I just got stuck behind Sainz for the first stint, but the team made a great strategy call, and we managed to overtake by pitting. This weekend proves how far the team have come, and we’re confident we can keep taking the fight to the front. However, today, the track position was very important, so I am happy with our work.

Andrea Stella

It was a positive day at Imola , and for the first time in 2024, McLaren has emerged as the highest-scoring team. P4 for Oscar came from good strategy and good pace, allowing him to gain a place on a day when it was not easy to do. P2 for Lando was a very strong result. It was a surprise to be in contention for the victory at the end of the race. It came about as a consequence of how sensitive the tyres were today. In the first stint, Max did a better job of managing the Medium, and after the stops, Lando did a very good job of managing the Hard, resisting the temptation to overdo it when Leclerc was catching up. It paid off at the end with a strong pace and being in the hunt for victory.

“Everyone at McLaren has worked very hard to make these results possible, and they have my thanks for the upgrades that have arrived over the last few weeks, but also for the commitment, the hard work, and the quality of that work. We need to keep improving the car. If we can do that, we’re going to be in a good position for the future.

The team has been in Emilia-Romagna, Italy, for the seventh round of the 2024 Formula One World Championship at iconic and storied Imola. Get the thoughts from Lance and Fernando following Sunday’s race, which saw our team pick up two championship points.

The European leg of the Formula One World Championship has begun, with the paddock at the historic Imola circuit for the 2024 Formula 1 Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix this weekend. Read Lance and Fernando’s thoughts following Sunday’s race.

Fernando Alonso

It was a difficult day and weekend in general for us. We started from the pit lane and changed a few things in the car’s setup. This allowed us to gather a lot of data, which we needed to analyse over the next couple of days.

“We opted for the Soft tyres at the start of the race, and we were hoping for a Safety Car to change things up. When nothing happened ahead of us, we looked to try a few different compounds out and essentially used it as a bit of a test session. We will need to regroup and put ourselves in the best position in Monaco.

Lance Stroll

It’s good to come away from Imola with a couple of points. We elected to extend our first stint on the Medium compounds, hoping for a Safety Car, but that never came, and so we had to make up positions on the track.

“That early tyre management meant I had the advantage of newer Hards towards the end of the race, giving me the pace to pass Nico [Hülkenberg] and Yuki [Tsunoda], which was fun. This weekend has been tough, though. We know we’re not as competitive as we want to be, and we’ll have to push hard to find the performance we’re missing.

Mike Krack, Team Principal:

We leave Imola with two important points following Lance’s strong drive and an excellent team strategy. Lance made his one-stop race work with a long first stint, while Fernando’s early pit stop on lap eight helped draw several cars in for early stops. Lance was then able to make strong overtakes into Turn 1 on Hülkenberg and Tsunoda to secure P9. It was not easy to overtake, so it was great to watch Lance make those moves.

“It was always going to be difficult for Fernando to progress to the points after the difficult Qualifying, but he played the team game perfectly. The Imola weekend showed that we are still not competitive enough. Our focus is on extracting the full potential of the AMR24 for the races to come, starting next week in Monaco.

Stake F1 Team KICK Sauber leaves the first race of the European calendar with no points to its name: leveraging different strategies, Valtteri Bottas pitted early, switching to the hard compound tyres, whereas Zhou Guanyu opted for a longer stint on hard tyres before switching to a new set of mediums. On a track where overtaking is difficult and with a long pitlane, Zhou was able to gain positions, ultimately finishing P15, while Valtteri, after running in P12, suffered the tyres’ degradation in the closing stages, reaching the chequered flag in P18.

The team, both trackside and in Hinwil, will continue to work hard to be in the fight for points at the historic circuit of Monte Carlo next weekend.

Valtteri Bottas

It’s been a pretty quiet afternoon on my end. We tried something different with my strategy, in contrast to Zhou’s, and stopped early. It was good to give it a try, as it worked okay for most of the race, although the second stint lasted a bit too long, and my tyres eventually dropped off over the last ten laps. It was always going to be slightly difficult to make progress on such a narrow track, especially as our starting position wasn’t ideal. In terms of upgrades, we did make a small step here, and we could have realised some more of our potential in qualifying had it not been for yesterday’s conditions, but of course, we need to improve further to properly get in the mix for points, as we have seen with our main competitors. The team back home is putting a lot of effort into delivering the next set of new parts, which should be implemented over the next few races. We will also have something more track-specific for Monaco – that, of course, is a race of its own, where it’s all about qualifying – it’ll be important to get that right to have a decent chance at points in the Principality.

Zhou Guanyu

Today’s race was quite uneventful in the beginning but picked up some action later on. We were hoping for a safety car to really benefit from our strategy – and while that didn’t happen, we still made it work, managed our tyres well, and gained positions. Unfortunately, most cars were on a similar one-stop strategy on a track where it’s hard to overtake and without any major incidents, we didn’t get close to the points, especially since we still needed to extract a bit more in terms of pace and performance. Next up is Monaco, and sometimes packages suddenly work better on a completely different track. The team keeps pushing, and we’ll give it our all to be up there fighting for points in the upcoming races.

Alessandro Alunni Bravi, Team Representative

We knew that starting from P16 and P17, we needed some special circumstances playing in our favour to be in the fight for points. However, what we saw today was a clean race, without any full or virtual safety car; we tried a different strategy for both cars but remained in a DRS train for most of the race. We had a decent pace on both compounds, especially compared with our direct competitors, but it was not enough to gain further positions. Zhou drove an aggressive race, starting on the hard tyres. Unfortunately, he had a moment with Esteban [Ocon] where he was pushed off the track and therefore lost the position. With Valtteri, we tried to extend the second stint on the hard compound and, therefore, pitted him early – unfortunately, the end of the race was difficult for him in terms of traction. The field is very tight, and we have seen that qualifying is the real race for us: any position we can gain on the starting grid can allow us to have a different Sunday. The target for the team is to find more pace in the car over the next few races, starting in Monaco. While today was the maximum we could have done, our analysis is that we need to improve – as quickly as possible.

MoneyGram Haas F1 Team finished with Nico Hulkenberg 11th and Kevin Magnussen 12th at the 2024 Formula 1 Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix, Round 7 of the Formula 1 World Championship, held Sunday at Imola.

Kevin Magnussen

Ayao Komatsu, Team Principal

Visa Cash App RB duo Yuki Tsunoda and Daniel Ricciardo finished in 10th and 13th, respectively.

Daniel Ricciardo

I don’t think anything went wrong with the start procedure, I felt like I did everything right, but unfortunately, losing that starting place did cost us the points in the race. We’ll figure it out as a team, just because there’s a bit of a lack of consistency there, and we immediately dropped out of the points. Then, during the race, we were in a train of cars, and being there with the dirty air is a weakness at the moment for us. We’ll keep looking at it. I think with the clean air, our pace was okay, and I was doing decent things, but as soon as we got in some traffic, we felt like we struggled more. That midfield we’re in it’s all about small details. We work hard for the qualifying position, so it’s important to be able to consolidate it at the start of the race. I think that if both Yuki and I stayed in front of Nico (Hulkenberg) at the start, we could’ve managed to stay there for the whole race, get on a little bit better with the pack and our race would have looked different. Let’s reset now, it’s been a couple of years now that I’m missing Monaco, so I’m looking ahead and I’m excited to go back there next week.

Yuki Tsunoda

At the end of the day, I’m happy I scored a point in front of our home crowd and people who came from the factory. I think our start slightly compromised our race because we lost a couple of positions to Nico (Hulkenberg). He was fast on the straights, so we didn’t want to end up behind him, which is why we pitted before him and earlier than planned. It was the crucial moment of the race, and I think we managed the strategy well and responded correctly to Nico. It meant we had to go long in our second stint and managing the hard tyre for the last 15 laps was challenging, but well done to the team for managing, that’s positive. The start is the main topic that we need to improve on. We’re working hard to take another step forward and we’ll focus on extracting the maximum out of our package. Monaco is up next, and I’m looking forward to it. We’ve been working hard and performing well, and I don’t have a doubt that we will maximise our performance.

Laurent Mekies – Team Principal

With just 15 kilometres separating our Faenza factory from the Imola circuit, this was always going to be a special event for us: our first home race under the Visa Cash App RB banner. It was great to have so many employees from the factory here at the track, creating a sort of “Blue Army” in a special VCARB grandstand and rotating our VIP passes to get as many of them as possible into the paddock. This was our way of thanking everyone in Faenza, Bicester and Honda for their hard work, which has been giving us good results to put us once again at the top of the midfield here in Imola. Even if today’s race leaves us a little bit disappointed, as a better start from both Yuki and Daniel would have probably created a better scenario for us, a point is a point, and there are many positives to take away from the weekend. Our qualifying performance proves that the upgrades we implemented in Miami are definitely bringing us a performance to go on fighting for sixth position in the Championship. And now we carry that momentum forward to face the unique challenge of Monaco. Daniel has been on the podium there no fewer than four times, including a win, and Yuki is currently in great form, so we will be pushing for another strong performance from the whole team.

Alex Albon

Logan Sargeant

Esteban started from P12 on New Mediums and finished P14: Pit Stop on Lap 25 for New Hards. Fastest Lap: 1min 21.304secs.

Pierre started from P15 on New Softs and finished P16: Pit Stops on Lap 8 for New Hards, Lap 30 for New Mediums. Fastest Lap: 1mins 21.371secs.

Esteban Ocon

It was a difficult race today and, in the end, a tricky weekend overall. Ultimately, we needed the pace to compete and the speed to attack or defend, which limited our options in the race. We managed to hold position initially but struggled to keep Lance [Stroll] behind at the beginning of the opening stint. Once he passed us, he pulled away, and we could not maintain ground to the others. We tried to extend our first stint to benefit from any teams making a late pit stop, but that did not happen. We were not in the fight this weekend, but we kept going, and we went again next week to Monaco. I have great memories from last year, so we go there with a positive frame of mind.

Pierre Gasly

Unfortunately, we did not get it quite right today. Given how the race unfolded, we needed to be quicker to compete higher up the grid, and our intended strategy was too far away to pay off. In general, though, the car was less competitive than yesterday, so we need to review what we could have done better as a team. Apart from that, the car felt more consistent at this track throughout the weekend, so we need to ensure we get the factors we can control right.

I’m looking forward to Monaco now. In the next couple of days, we have lots to analyse to ensure we are prepared for the streets of Monte Carlo.

Bruno Famin – Team Principal

Today, the team in Imola had a difficult race. We lacked pace, and the alternative strategy we attempted with Pierre did not work, as no incidents were on track. The race leaders were swift today, and we were caught early on with blue flags, which cost us additional time. We must focus on our performance and analyse the data to understand our race pace deficit. We can only control the areas we have in our hands. Next week, we return to the legendary Monaco. It’s a race with fond memories for the team from last year, and we look forward to racing there again with a resilient and motivated attitude and aiming for a good result.