Montoya urges Ferrari to intervene after Monza disaster

Ferrari left Monza with the grandstands stunned into silence and a former Formula 1 firebrand calling for intervention from the very top of the company.

Juan Pablo Montoya believes the situation has reached the point where Ferrari’s senior hierarchy must step in and lay down strict ground rules between Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc, after a chaotic opening to the Italian Grand Prix wrecked the team’s home race.

On a day when the tifosi came expecting a red celebration, they watched a silver rout instead. Mercedes walked away with a dominant 1-2, Kimi Antonelli storming from 19th on the grid to victory in one of the standout drives of the 2026 season.

Ferrari’s race disintegrated almost immediately.

Hamilton launched aggressively at the start, diving down the inside of Leclerc into Turn 1 before trying to hang on around the outside of Turn 2. Leclerc held his line. Hamilton ran out of road, skated through the gravel and tumbled down to 10th.

The damage, though, was only beginning.

On lap two, Leclerc—locked in a fight with McLaren’s Oscar Piastri—ran wide onto the kerb on the exit of Parabolica. The Ferrari snapped away from him and slammed into the barriers. The home favourite was out. The crowd groaned. Hamilton, recovering from the first-lap excursion, could do no better than sixth at the flag.

Speaking to F1 TV afterwards, Hamilton, currently third in the drivers’ standings, called the result a “tough one to swallow”. The phrase fit the mood across the whole of Maranello.

Montoya, analysing Ferrari’s implosion on the broadcast, did not spare the Scuderia’s star pairing—or its leadership.

“They need to go to not only Fred but above Fred and sit them down,” he said, urging that both Hamilton and Leclerc be summoned to Maranello before this weekend’s Spanish Grand Prix in Madrid. “Both of them need to go to Maranello this week, and they need to sit down and have a proper talk because, in my opinion, Charles came out and said, ‘I raced Lewis like I would have raced anybody else.’”

Montoya’s verdict was blunt.

“But it's your team-mate, and you've got to respect your team-mate, and you've got to respect the team."

The fallout is not just emotional; it is mathematical.

Hamilton’s sixth place leaves him 10 points behind second-placed George Russell in the championship and 76 adrift of leader Antonelli, whose surge at Monza underlined the scale of Mercedes’ momentum. Leclerc sits fifth on 155 points, 112 behind Antonelli, his title hopes now hanging by a thread.

Ferrari arrived at Monza dreaming of a statement win. They left with wrecked bodywork, bruised egos, and a clear warning from one of racing’s most uncompromising voices: if the drivers can’t draw the line themselves, the people “above Fred” will have to do it for them.