Jacques Villeneuve criticized the management of the race in Monza

1997 World Champion Jacques Villeneuve joined the critics of Monza’s race directorate for finishing the Grand Prix behind the safety car…

Jacques Villeneuve: “The race in Monza was not very exciting – we didn’t see a strategic battle, no clear battles on the track. The race was pretty boring compared to other Grands Prix we’ve seen this year. We wanted more but didn’t get it.

This is partly due to the unsatisfactory performance of the race management. They didn’t perform well as the season went on, but Monza was at its lowest point. Races should be exciting with aggressive combat, and they should be controlled accordingly. We don’t have endurance races, but Formula 1!

Races must never end behind the safety car. There were so many options for doing it differently: putting up red flags, letting those behind the lap pass the safety car earlier. There was still plenty of time – the riders could do at least two laps.

What happened made me think that things weren’t so bad before. Of course there were mistakes, but in every situation we saw the desire to resume the race as soon as possible. On Sunday there was no such desire – this is wrong, it is necessary to avoid such finishes.

Nick de Vries impressed me. On Friday he had his first practice behind the wheel of one car, and on Saturday he immediately found the rhythm behind the wheel of another. He hasn’t done many races at such a high level after Formula 2 – I don’t think Formula E is comparable to Formula 1, it’s a different world.

In Monza he was under pressure and this is the best way to judge a rider. Not only speed is important, but also how he knows how to deal with such situations. Nick performed brilliantly and confirmed what we already knew about Nicholas Latifi – he can’t handle it. If I was Williams’ head, I’d give De Vries a chance. Or he can get a job at Alpine. Nick is a fast racer who got the job done in tough conditions, so why not give him a chance?

Given the advantage in the individual classification, Max Verstappen can already guarantee himself the title in Singapore, and Ferrari can help him with that. I can still understand Charles Leclerc’s pit stop during the virtual safety car (stop using this mode!), but I can’t understand the second pit stop when Charles was in the lead. There is always a chance of red flags or a safety car and on top of that the tires on his car were in good condition at the time.

Ferrari didn’t have the speed to overtake Red Bull after the second pit stop, so why not try to stay on track? Leclerc might still have finished second, but at least he tried to fight.