2012 Italian Grand Prix

Dry and sizzlingly sunny [ 2 ] Air temp 28 °C (82 °F) [ 2 ]

The 2012 Italian Grand Prix (formally known as the Formula 1 Gran Premio Santander d'Italia 2012 ) [ 1 ] was a Formula One motor race that took place at the Autodromo Nazionale di Monza in Monza , Italy on 9 September 2012. [ 3 ] It was the thirteenth race of the 2012 season , and the final race in Europe before the teams returned to Asia for the Singapore Grand Prix .

Lewis Hamilton qualified on pole, ahead of teammate Jenson Button . The result gave McLaren their sixty-second front-row lock-out, breaking the previous record set by Williams . [ 4 ] Hamilton won the race by four seconds from Sergio Pérez , with Fernando Alonso completing the podium. [ 5 ]

Tyre supplier Pirelli brought its silver-banded hard compound tyre as the harder "prime" tyre and the white-banded medium compound tyre as the softer "option" tyre. [ 6 ]

Pastor Maldonado received two five-place grid penalties. the first for jumping the start of the Belgian Grand Prix and the second for causing an avoidable accident with Timo Glock after Grosjean's accident. [ 11 ]

Paul di Resta was also demoted five places for an unscheduled gearbox change on Saturday morning, his second gearbox penalty of the season. [ 12 ]

Ma Qinghua became the first Chinese driver to take part in a Grand Prix weekend when he drove Narain Karthikeyan 's HRT F112 in the first free practice session on Friday morning. [ 13 ] Valtteri Bottas drove Bruno Senna 's Williams FW34 in the same session, while Jules Bianchi took Paul di Resta 's place at Force India .

Mercedes AMG driver Michael Schumacher was fastest in the first practice session, three-tenths of a second quicker than Jenson Button and Nico Rosberg . [ 14 ] For Lotus , Jérôme d'Ambrosio finished the session fifteenth, over a second and a half slower than Schumacher and sixth-tenths down on teammate Kimi Räikkönen . Ma Qinghua was the slowest runner after ninety minutes, nearly six seconds slower than Schumacher, and within two seconds of teammate Pedro de la Rosa . At the end of the session,...

Lewis Hamilton was the fastest driver in the second session, [ 15 ] narrowly edging out Button and Alonso, the latter of whom had another disrupted session with a series of technical problems surrounding the gearbox and brakes that limited his time on the circuit. Having set the fastest time in the morning session, Schumacher finished tenth following a series of off-track excursions. He was highly-critical of the speed bumps placed around the Variante della Roggia chicane, claiming they were a s...

Hamilton was once again fastest in the third session, just one thousandth of a second ahead of Alonso. [ 16 ] Paul di Resta finished the session third, while Sebastian Vettel suffered a loss of power on his final lap and pulled over at the Roggia chicane. The Red Bull RB8 was consistently one of the slowest cars through the speed trap, evidenced by the way neither Red Bull driver featured in the top ten runners in any of the free practice sessions, with the exception of Mark Webber , who set the...

Felipe Massa made a great start to pass Jenson Button for second place. He pulled alongside pole sitter Lewis Hamilton going into the first chicane, but Hamilton had the inside line and was able to stay ahead. Fernando Alonso was able to make his way up from 10th to 7th place by the end of the first lap, and passed Kimi Räikkönen for 6th going into the first chicane on the second lap.

On lap 4, Sebastian Vettel passed Michael Schumacher under braking into the first chicane for 4th place. One lap later, Bruno Senna attempted to pass Nico Rosberg around the outside into the first chicane. Senna turned into Rosberg, they banged wheels, and Senna went straight through the chicane to take 11th. Fernando Alonso was able to pass Schumacher coming out of the Parabolica on lap 7.

On lap 8, Bruno Senna tried to pass Paul di Resta on the outside going into the second chicane. Di Resta moved over, forcing Senna onto the gravel. Senna went straight through the chicane and back onto the racing line right in front of Mark Webber, who dodged around him as they entered the first Lesmo corner. On the next lap, Jean-Éric Vergne had a right rear suspension failure under braking into the first chicane. He spun and slid sideways over one of the curbs, launching his car into the air o...

Jenson Button retook 2nd place from Felipe Massa in the 2nd chicane on lap 19, who was suffering from a loss of telemetry and pitted on lap 20. Fernando Alonso and Sebastian Vettel pitted at the same time on lap 21, and came out right behind Massa with only a car's length separating each of the three. Lewis Hamilton pitted on lap 24, allowing Sergio Pérez, who hadn't pitted yet, to take the lead from 2nd.

On lap 26, Fernando Alonso tried to go around the outside of Sebastian Vettel through Curva Grande. Vettel moved to the outside, pushing Alonso off the track and onto the grass. Alonso managed to keep control of his car and was furious at Vettel's antics. The move was similar to a move Vettel pulled on Alonso the year before, but this time Vettel was given a drive-through penalty. Alonso was able to pass Vettel on lap 29, and the drive-through on lap 35 put Vettel in 9th place behind Webber.

Notes:

Sebastian Vettel , Nico Hülkenberg and Mark Webber retired but were classified as they completed more than 90% of the winner's race distance

Drivers' Championship standings

Constructors' Championship standings