Welcome to The Briefing, where we’ll be answering the key on-track questions ahead of the Italian Grand Prix.

Each week, powered by Google Cloud, we’ll be speaking to one of our trackside experts to walk you through the biggest talking points and provide you with a simplified guide of what you’ll need to know to jump straight into the action. This week, ahead of FP1, we spoke to Cédric Michel-Grosjean.

The Autodromo Nazionale Monza is an interesting one for engineers. It’s one of the fastest and most exciting circuits on the calendar, but it isn’t just a case of unleashing the MCL39 at full capacity – it presents some interesting challenges that they’ll need to consider and prepare for.

Full of long straights and tight turns, the circuit is famously among the most power-sensitive on the calendar, demanding a lot from the engine and the brakes. Success has traditionally been found in running with as little downforce as possible, which requires teams to minimise drag and maximise straight-line speed… but this isn’t always the case, as last year proved.

These are some of the decisions the team will be making in practice. In this weekend’s edition of The Briefing, Cédric will explain how the team will look to answer these questions and what outcomes they’re expecting.

Development Driver Alex Dunne is in Oscar’s car for this session. Is there an FP1 plan built around Alex?

Alex attended both simulator sessions last week and spent some time with us yesterday. He’s also got Formula 2 on his schedule this weekend, so he’s going to be pretty busy.

In Austria, when Alex did his first FP1 session, driving Lando’s car, he had quite an interrupted session, doing some runs with rakes fitted. Here, it’s the programme Oscar would have run, the standard FP1: two sets of tyres, and the usual mix of push-cool-push and continuous laps. We’ll do some flo-vis on the car, but there are no other test items – though he will be running a higher wing level than Lando, which isn’t a bad place for a rookie to start.

Monza is traditionally a race to unveil a new, low-drag rear wing. Do we have one this year?

Yes. We have a wing that hasn’t run yet. Lando will be trying it out in FP1, with Alex running the wing that we had in Belgium for comparison. This is the same approach that we took last year, when Lando also started on the lower downforce level and Oscar on the higher.

Last year, the team decided to go with the higher downforce level. Is there a preference this year?

The potential difference between this year and last is the grip level. Last year, Monza had a new surface, hadn’t seen a lot of running before the Grand Prix weekend, and the grip level was very low, which pushed us to run a little more downforce on the car. This year, we’d expect the rear wing designed for Monza to be better – but this is why we have practice. We’ll know more later today.

There are plenty of other variables in play. We have different beam wing configurations to consider and some front wing trims. We also have to see where we are compared to other cars for end-of-straight speed, whether we’re prioritising qualifying pace or looking after tyres in the race, and so on.

What setup choices are you keen to investigate today?

Last year, after the resurfacing work, the ride was in line with the season averages, not as bad as it had been previously. We’ll be checking that it hasn’t moved too much, allowing us to run decent stiffness. It’s a balance between roll stiffness from Turn 6 [the first Lesmo] onwards, after which the lap is medium- and high-speed corners, versus the first two chicanes, where you can offset the roll stiffness with front heave to have better kerb-riding. It’s about how we trade those two parameters.

Then, in terms of ride-heights, it’s both front and rear that we try to minimise. The high speeds push the car into the surface, and so Monza is a track where there is quite a bit of grounding on both the bib and the back of the car. There are also big impacts on some of the kerbs. Turn 7 exit, Ascari, and then over some of the bumps that still exist – the worst being out of Parabolica.

We have the same tyre range as 2024, albeit with slightly different compounds. What do we need to learn about those?

Understanding the grip-level is important. Last year, on the resurfaced track, there was a lot of graining. That will be a big talking point, especially towards the softer end of the range, and we’ll need to understand it. Last year here, there wasn’t much tyre wear, so the graining isn’t something that necessarily cleans up as the tyre gets older.

Additionally, the C3 [Hard] tyre in recent races hasn’t been the most robust in the range, so we’ll be keen to discover whether a one-stop race – the winning strategy last year – is still possible, or if two stops is better. Overtaking is difficult at Monza. The impact of dirty air makes it tough to get close and, as always with a low downforce level, the DRS isn’t very effective, so you need a very good reason to add extra stops.

There are also things to learn for Qualifying. Do you get the best of the tyre on the first lap, or does it actually improve on a second push lap because of the low micro-roughness of the surface? Will it repeat well on a second run?

Finally, how tough is the circuit for brake performance?

We don't expect it to be one of the most critical circuits. Baku, next time out, is tough, because the brakes get very cold on the long straight, and Mexico is difficult because of the lack of cooling at altitude – but Monza is not like either of those. There is a trade to be made between wear resistance and cold performance though. The two big stops into the chicanes come at the end of long straights where the brakes get cold. There’s a huge temperature delta.

There is a question of driver confidence attached to this. It takes a few attempts for the driver to really have confidence that the car can brake as hard as it needs to and slow down enough for the chicane when the brakes are cold – but this is why we have practice.

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