Santino Ferrucci's diary - Bizarre weekend in Monza

Last week I was in Monza, Italy, at the famous Autodromo Nazionale Monza where Formula 1 has been racing since its inception. The week was off to a great start with being P3 overall, P1 in the afternoon on Wednesday’s test. In Friday Qualifying 1, I was really quick! I ended up second, only two tenths off the pace. Qualifying 2 and 3 (a combined session) I ended up fifth and sixth, which was still awesome in a 35 car field. The car had good speed so I was feeling really confident for the races.

In Race 1, I had a good start and was in third with 14 of 19 laps complete. Unfortunately another competitor got a little too aggressive and tried to pass me by cutting in front of me taking off my front wing and front right wheel, ending my day.

The set up had been really good so Ralf (my engineer) and I didn't change the car for Race 2 which was a bit more exciting! I started sixth, and in turn one took fourth. I was really fast and the car was really good. Unfortunate for me there were a lot of safety cars, at least three, and some really bad accidents. The accidents were so bad that the stewards ended the race a few laps early with a red flag. I never got a good clean chance to pass my teammate for third and I felt as if I would have had no problem passing him later.

After so many crashes from races 1 and 2, the race director called for an emergency briefing at 7.30pm. After all the drivers arrived in the briefing room, he immediately started to yell at us for bad driving. Unfortunately our argument was that they never penalized anybody, and the truth being that too many kids don’t respect the speed and still think they are in karting. So after they yelled at us for 45 minutes and had a big debate, the main steward said that we were not allowed to leave the track until we were cleared to go and then said that he didn’t care if it took until 2am! He also told us that we needed to stop eating mushrooms and smoking stuff… I think most of us are too young to get the mushroom thing. Then he threatened that if we had any more incidents the next day, he would end the race under the safety car. The stewards gave out two exclusion penalties and two others had to start Race 3 from the pit lane.

A few of us drivers were talking and we are not sure what is going on but clearly there is something wrong as one team appears to avoid penalties. A few races ago the polesitter started the race completely out of his box and yet received no penalty. On Sunday, the same car started the restart driving way out of the track limits and again no penalty. I was penalized a few races ago because I passed a car (did not touch him) and was told my pass was too aggressive and I was penalized 25 positions and lost my fifth place points (and the car I passed didn’t lose a spot except my pass). On Saturday, I was taken out by a car from that team and of course no penalty and this morning one of that team’s drivers was to start from pit lane but took his normal grid position. A little strange we thought.

So take a guess why Sunday’s race ended early.  The car that took his normal grid position took out my teammate and caused the final red flag.  Go figure. Something is seriously wrong.

Remember I said they would keep us Saturday night for as long at it took? Well, they did. The Stewards kept us at the track very late.  I got back to the hotel at 1am and I was amongst the first 15 drivers to leave. Most of us managed 6 hours of sleep I assume, followed by an early race…

Race 3 didn't make much sense and lasted three whole laps. Racing at Monza, there is no downforce so the draft allows for a lot of overtaking which makes it fun, but there will be a crash or two for sure. In that third race, someone crashed badly in Turn 1 and needed to get extracted from his car. He simply missed his brake zone by a few meters and drove over another car. We did only seven laps and like I said, just three under green flag conditions. I ended up finishing eighth because one of my teammates decided to pass me around the outside through Asgari (Turn 7), drove off the track and came back on and nearly T-boned me! I lost three spots and dropped to ninth. I worked my way back to 7th but got passed late when another driver cut the track to pass me in Turn 1 and, surprise surprise, no penalty.

The weekend overall was very good for learning and I am very happy with my qualifying! I finally was able to show my speed in qualifying and the races.

I am finally getting back to Connecticut after six weeks in Europe.  I will be home for a week and then back to begin training and preparation for our next race at Spa-Francorchamps in Belgium.

A huge thank you to my engineer Ralf “Einstein” Drünkenmuller for a good car and my mechanics for making sure it was always race ready! Also to the sponsors who make this all possible Eastern Account System Inc., Cly-Del Manufacturing, Alpinestars, Arai, and Brett King Design.

Thanks for reading!

Santino Ferrucci