The 2016 Monza GP2 Series round was a GP2 Series motor race held on 3 and 4 September 2016 at the Autodromo Nazionale Monza in Italy. It was the ninth round of the 2016 GP2 Series. The race weekend supported the 2016 Italian Grand Prix.
Report Qualifying Pierre Gasly took another pole with team-mate Antonio Giovinazzi in a close second to continue the dominant form of the Prema team. However, due to irregularities in the tyre pressures, Giovinazzi was demoted toward the end of the grid, elevating third place Artem Markelov to the front row. The second row would consist of Arthur Pic and Mitch Evans.
Driver Team Time Gap 1 21 Pierre Gasly Prema Racing 1:31.199 – 1 EX 20 Antonio Giovinazzi Prema Racing 1:31.253 +0.054 21 2 10 Artem Markelov Russian Time 1:31.548 +0.349 2 3 12 Arthur Pic Rapax 1:31.617 +0.418 3 4 7 Mitch Evans Campos Racing 1:31.666 +0.467 4 5 4 Jordan King Racing Engineering 1:31.710 +0.511 5 6 5 Alex Lynn DAMS 1:31.775 +0.576 6 EX 24 Nabil Jeffri Arden International 1:31.795 +0.596 22 7 2 Sergey Sirotkin ART Grand Prix 1:31.816 +0.617 7 8 3 Norman Nato Racing Engineering 1:31.846 +0.646 8 9 15 Luca Ghiotto Trident 1:31.855 +0.656 9 10 22 Oliver Rowland MP Motorsport 1:31.864 +0.665 10 11 9 Raffaele Marciello Russian Time 1:31.986 +0.787 11 12 1 Nobuharu Matsushita ART Grand Prix 1:32.037 +0.838 12 13 19 Marvin Kirchhöfer Carlin 1:32.172 +0.973 13 14 6 Nicholas Latifi DAMS 1:32.192 +0.993 14 15 18 Sergio Canamasas Carlin 1:32.196 +0.997 15 16 11 Gustav Malja Rapax 1:32.215 +1.016 16 17 8 Sean Gelael Campos Racing 1:32.481 +1.282 17 18 23 Daniel de Jong MP Motorsport 1:33.071 +1.872 18 19 14 Philo Paz Armand Trident 1:33.269 +2.070 19 20 25 Jimmy Eriksson Arden International 1:33.929 +2.730 20 Source:
Notes
1. – Giovinazzi and Jeffri were excluded from qualifying after being deemed to run illegal tyre pressures during the session.
Feature Race Antonio Giovinazzi won what was a chaotic race after a mid-race accident shuffled the pack and elevated himself, Raffaele Marciello and Gustav Malja up the pack. On lap 15, an Arthur Pic collided with Sergio Canamasas through the second Lesmo. The pair were racing side-by-side and after barely leaving enough space through the corner, Pic lost control through the corner and counter-steered straight into Canamasas' rear wheel, sending him into a roll. Pic expressed frustration with the incident, although stewards later deemed him to be at fault for the incident - handing him a three-place grid penalty as a consequence. The safety car put Gasly from a comfortable first to fourth and now behind drivers on brand-new tyres. With four laps to go, it was Marciello leading from Giovinazzi and Malja. On the final lap, Giovinazzi benefited from the use of DRS and passed Marciello to take a home victory from Marciello (thereby making it an Italian one-two) and Malja. As well as this, Luca Ghiotto achieved the fastest lap, completing a successful race for the Italians on home soil.
Driver Team Laps Time/Retired Grid Points 1 20 Antonio Giovinazzi Prema Racing 30 52:28.474 21 25 2 9 Raffaele Marciello Russian Time 30 +1.457 11 18 3 11 Gustav Malja Rapax 30 +1.988 16 15 4 21 Pierre Gasly Prema Racing 30 +2.294 1 12 (4) 5 3 Norman Nato Racing Engineering 30 +2.809 8 10 6 15 Luca Ghiotto Trident 30 +2.823 9 8 (2) 7 4 Jordan King Racing Engineering 30 +3.896 5 6 8 7 Mitch Evans Campos Racing 30 +6.311 4 4 9 22 Oliver Rowland MP Motorsport 30 +7.898 10 2 10 10 Artem Markelov Russian Time 30 +9.416 2 1 11 1 Nobuharu Matsushita ART Grand Prix 30 +10.277 12 12 5 Alex Lynn DAMS 30 +11.013 6 13 24 Nabil Jeffri Arden International 30 +17.807 22 14 2 Sergey Sirotkin ART Grand Prix 30 +18.524 7 15 25 Jimmy Eriksson Arden International 30 +18.109 20 16 6 Nicholas Latifi DAMS 30 +22.201 14 17 23 Daniel de Jong MP Motorsport 30 +22.555 18 18 19 Marvin Kirchhöfer Carlin 30 +22.833 13 19 14 Philo Paz Armand Trident 30 +23.482 19 Ret 18 Sergio Canamasas Carlin 15 Collision 15 Ret 12 Arthur Pic Rapax 15 Collision 3 DSQ 8 Sean Gelael Campos Racing 29 Disqualified 17 Fastest lap: Luca Ghiotto (Trident) – 1:33.980 (on lap 27) Source:
Notes
1. – Eriksson was given a five-second penalty after having been deemed to have forced another driver off the circuit. 2. – Gelael was initially given a ten-second stop-go penalty for failing to slow under double-yellow flags, after setting his fastest sector times under the Safety Car period. After crossing the start/finish line more than twice without serving the penalty, he was disqualified from the race.
Sprint Race Norman Nato took his first win since the opening race of the championship, beating the Prema Racing pair of Gasly and Giovinazzi with a comfortable margin.
Driver Team Laps Time/Retired Grid Points 1 3 Norman Nato Racing Engineering 21 33:51.821 4 15 2 21 Pierre Gasly Prema Racing 21 +4.312 5 12 3 20 Antonio Giovinazzi Prema Racing 21 +8.495 8 10 4 4 Jordan King Racing Engineering 21 +12.775 2 8 5 5 Alex Lynn DAMS 21 +13.576 12 6 6 1 Nobuharu Matsushita ART Grand Prix 21 +13.586 11 4 7 11 Gustav Malja Rapax 21 +21.526 6 2 8 19 Marvin Kirchhöfer Carlin 21 +22.566 17 1 9 22 Oliver Rowland MP Motorsport 21 +29.225 9 10 10 Artem Markelov Russian Time 21 +32.813 10 (2) 11 12 Arthur Pic Rapax 21 +34.192 21 12 24 Nabil Jeffri Arden International 21 +34.194 13 13 18 Sergio Canamasas Carlin 21 +36.845 20 14 9 Raffaele Marciello Russian Time 21 +40.665 7 15 6 Nicholas Latifi DAMS 21 +41.503 16 16 8 Sean Gelael Campos Racing 21 +44.059 22 17 14 Philo Paz Armand Trident 21 +48.628 19 18 25 Jimmy Eriksson Arden International 20 +1 Lap 15 19 23 Daniel de Jong MP Motorsport 20 +1 Lap 17 Ret 2 Sergey Sirotkin ART Grand Prix 6 Retired 14 Ret 7 Mitch Evans Campos Racing 0 Collision 1 Ret 15 Luca Ghiotto Trident 0 Collision 3 Fastest lap: Artem Markelov (Russian Time) – 1:33.727 (on lap 5) Source:
1. – Markelov and Latifi were penalised after it was deemed that neither driver slowed sufficiently for the Virtual Safety Car. They were each given the equivalent of a drive-through-penalty (20 seconds) applied to their race times.
Standings after the round
Drivers' Championship standings Driver Points 1 Pierre Gasly 172 2 Antonio Giovinazzi 164 3 Raffaele Marciello 138 4 Sergey Sirotkin 115 1 5 Jordan King 112
Teams' Championship standings Team Points 1 Prema Racing 336 2 Russian Time 220 3 Racing Engineering 219 4 ART Grand Prix 177 1 5 DAMS 114
Note: Only the top five positions are included for both sets of standings.
See also 2016 Italian Grand Prix 2016 Monza GP3 Series round
References
External links Official website of GP2 Series