14/09/2025 14:45
You are Lewis Hamilton and Felipe Massa, heading to the 2008
Italian Grand Prix, locked in a fierce fight for the F1 world
title, after a controversial penalty last time out. Hamilton had
been stripped of his Belgian GP win after a stewards' penalty, with
Massa inheriting the win to reduce Hamilton's points lead to just
two, as Massa faced the biggest test of the season: the Tifosi at
Monza. The only problem was that a dreadful weather forecast lay in
store, with Saturday and Sunday set to be wet. Very wet. Enter one
Sebastian Vettel, a rookie in his first full season for Red Bull's
junior team, Toro Rosso, or, once upon a time, Minardi. Vettel's
season had begun to pick up the pace with points in five of the
previous eight races, after four straight DNFs and a 17th to start
the season. He had also shown his wet weather prowess with a
fifth-place in Monaco, but on the flip-side, had been eliminated in
a first lap collision at Silverstone. But as Massa and Hamilton
fluffed their lines with sixth and a lowly 15th on the grid, Vettel
truly announced himself in the most stunning way possible. Here's
Seb Vettel bagged a maiden career pole and, to this day, remains
the youngest ever grand prix pole-sitter at 21 years, two months,
11 days, although Kimi Antonelli broke this for the 2025 Miami GP
Sprint race. But Helmut Marko's first true protege was not expected
to stay there. Heikki Kovalainen in the second McLaren was second
on the grid and the smart money on Saturday evening was that the
Finn would claim a second F1 win and Vettel's balloon would be
burst. Even better for Red Bull's second team, effectively running
the 2007 RB3 repainted in Toro Rosso colours, Sebastien Bourdais
was fourth on the grid. But then the race started, behind the
safety car, as Bourdais's afternoon was effectively over after a
problem on the grid, with a rolling start getting the 53 laps
underway. Vettel quickly answered as to whether he could weather
the weather, pulling six seconds on Kovalainen in eight laps, and
that was the last anyone saw of him that afternoon. Records
smashed In the end, Vettel would win by 12.5s from Kovalainen as
Robert Kubica charged from 11th to nab a podium, with the average
age being 23 years, 11 months and 16 days. That was a record in
itself until the Max Verstappen-Pierre Gasly-Carlos Sainz rostrum
at the 2019 Brazilian GP of 23 years, eight months, 13 days. But
Vettel had announced himself. The world took notice of the
then-youngest-ever driver to win a grand prix, in what was
effectively a Minardi, and to this day, Vettel remains the
second-youngest driver to claim P1, no prizes for guessing who took
that record... Whilst Vettel basked in the glory of his win,
another unique record was set, one that only he holds. Ferrari
engines have, as of the 2025 Italian GP, won 249 grands prix, but
the works Ferrari team have won 248. Vettel's victory, with a
customer Ferrari engine in the back, is the only time in the
history of F1 where a non-works Ferrari-powered car has won a grand
prix. As for Massa and Hamilton, they trailed home sixth and
seventh to reduce Hamilton's points lead to one heading for the
800th world championship grand prix, F1's first-ever night race in
Singapore. And that wouldn't prove to be controversial and still
rumbling on to this day, at all...
