McLaren not appearing to be as comfortable as in previous races has left Formula 1 rivals snapping at its heels at the Italian Grand Prix – and opened up the prospect of some unpredictable shenanigans potentially shaping the grid.
After a run of races where there had been little doubt that Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri would be in a class of their own, there is a very different vibe at Monza after the first day of running.
For not only is the gap between the McLarens and the rest much smaller than normal, but the margins between all the leading teams all seem much more compressed here.
Based on what we saw in FP2, there is less than two tenths of a second covering quickest man Norris down to Red Bull’s Max Verstappen in sixth.
This appears to be a consequence of both the downforce levels and track characteristics shifting things away from McLaren, and potentially not exposing the weaknesses of some of its rivals that have struggled at medium speed venues.
As Norris remarked afterwards: “Normally by this point we have like a one-second gap on everyone but at the moment it looks just a bit close for my liking.
“This is the complete opposite downforce level to Zandvoort where we were easily quickest and it felt pretty amazing. Here's quite the opposite so not surprised.
“We were expecting that kind of thing but I definitely think we don't perform quite to the same level in these low downforce conditions as we do when we're at high downforce. The competitors catch up, it looks a bit closer and that makes our life a bit trickier.”
Another important element that keeps things close is that Monza has fewer turns than a lot of other venues – with effectively just six corners.
Slipstream games
Just how tight things are – and how tiny margins could well make all the difference in each qualifying segment on Saturday – has opened the door for a potentially chaotic element that Monza seemed to have eradicated in recent years: slipstream games.
The advantages of getting a perfect tow around here – which is understood to be when you are around three to four seconds behind a car ahead of you – may not be worth the six-tenths it was in the older generation cars.
However, even the 0.1 – 0.2 seconds that are on offer now cannot be overlooked in terms of how influential they are. As Friday showed, that can be the difference between pole and the third row.
And that leaves teams facing two clear choices when it comes to trying to gain the benefit that comes from it.
The first is rolling the dice and trying to find an (unwilling) accomplice ahead of you on track to help pull you along.
With the maximum-delta time for out laps in place, getting positioned behind another car is in theory easier than in the past – when drivers would try to play games in the final sector by backing off to get the perfect window.
It was the chaotic scenes of Monza qualifying in 2019 that proved the catalyst for the delta time limits that are imposed now.
However, the key to maximising the opportunities of getting a good slipstream from the car ahead very much depends on drivers getting behind the right car.
It will be no good if you get stuck behind someone, which requires a different kind of preparation lap, either in slowing things down so you get too close, or runs too quick so you fall out of the ideal window.
You also do not want to be in a position where you engineer a good tow, but you then hand an even better one to the car behind.
The problem with nailing the perfect car to get behind is that it is a nigh on impossible task, due to the pitlane games that have been going on all season.
With the rules meaning drivers cannot push in to the fast lane if others are coming down it already, it’s all too easy to end up too far down the order or stuck behind cars you do not want to be.
The other option then for teams that want to get that slipstream gain is to break free from trying their chance with rivals. Instead, they can go it alone and do their own thing.
Those who have team-mates that are more agreeable to work with each other could in theory be positioned to engineer proper slipstreams for the car behind.
It is not something that you can imagine Piastri and Norris being asked to do as they fight for the F1 title, but there is one team where there would be a lot more logic to doing so: Ferrari.
A Ferrari opportunity?
Lewis Hamilton is heading into the Italian Grand Prix with a five-place grid penalty as the result of ignoring the double yellow flag on the reconnaissance laps before the Dutch GP.
It means that if he gets through to Q3 alongside team-mate Charles Leclerc, then it makes total sense for him to act as the front-gunner – helping pull his team-mate along to a pole position that he would not be able to take himself.
Speaking about the prospect on Thursday, Hamilton had suggested he would definitely be open to the idea – even if it was something that he did not personally like doing.
“I know that Ferrari used to do it many years ago,” he said. “I remember when I started at least, I noticed Kimi [Raikkonen] and Felipe [Massa] used to do that often.
“It can be beneficial, but in my past it felt like there was more risk, and often one person had to be sacrificed for it. So I’m not sure whether they will do that this weekend.
“It’s not been discussed. But if it meant getting Charles there, then I would be happy to play that role.”
The ultimate challenge a team faces in doing this is in ensuring that the execution works – and having two cars out on track is not impacted by someone else forcing their way in between.
The only way to do that would be to go much earlier than everyone else – so you can control the gaps and speeds of your two cars.
But decoupling yourself from the cycle of the other cars opens up other risks – such as hitting a run of traffic on your flying lap if everyone is coming out of the pits.
There are going to be a lot of difficult decisions to make on the fly on Saturday for anyone who wants to get pole, and there is going to be an awful lot of luck involved in helping open up opportunities for some.
But the acceptance based on how tight things are at Monza is that nobody is going to be the master of their own destiny in that fight for pole position.
