The new Williams car remains a work in progress. (Photo: Getty Images)

Williams
Pastor Maldonado went into the weekend knowing that he faced a 10-place grid penalty after his problems at Spa, and having managed only 12th in Q2 he tumbled down to 22nd. The penalty did at least move team mate Bruno Senna up from 14th to 13th. The Brazilian ran 10th early on before dropping back in the middle of the race, but a last lap problem allowed him to pass Ricciardo and claim a point. Starting on the hard tire Maldonado quickly passed the backmarkers and his two-stop strategy saw him move up to 11th by the flag.

Caterham
Heikki Kovalainen looked like he might make Q2 until Jerome D’Ambrosio found some time and knocked him out. The Finn earned 18th while birthday boy was Vitaly Petrov 19th, both men then moving up a spot after Maldonado was demoted. After a scrappy race in Belgium a week earlier Kovalainen was much happier with his performance in Italy on his way to 14th place. Petrov spent much of the afternoon behind his team mate, but couldn’t find a way past. In the end the margin between them was only 0.2s, both drivers having run on two-stop strategies.

Marussia
Marussia was a little closer to Caterham than at some recent races, although Timo Glock felt he could have gone faster after struggling with his second set of tires. Glock and Charles Pic qualified 20th and 21st, both moving up one place thanks to Maldonado’s penalty. Glock damaged a front wing end plate on Petrov at the start, which meant an early stop for a new nose which spoiled his strategy and left him with a long middle stint. He eventually finished 17th, a place behind Pic, who had to switch from one to two stops due to worse than expected tire degradation.

HRT F1 Team's Spanish driver Pedro Martinez de la Rosa attends a press conference at the Spa-Francorchamps circuit on August 30, 2012 in Spa ahead of the Belgium Formula One Grand Prix. (Photo: Getty Images)

HRT
Pedro de la Rosa celebrated his 100th start in Monza, although it had taken him since 1999 to reach the mark! Ironically for the first time this season he was outqualified by his team mate. Narain Karthikeyan gained a place from Maldonado’s penalty and started 21st while Pedro was 23rd. De la Rosa had a fairly quiet race, and having felt much better on the harder tire in the second half, he finished 18th. Karthikeyan passed both Marussias initially but then lost out in a tangle at the first chicane. He had a new nose fitted at his single pit stop and finished 19th.

Adam Cooper notched up his 27th season as a racing journalist in 2011. He has written about F1 for SPEED.com since 2005. Follow him on Twitter.

The opinions reflected herein are solely those of the above commentator and are not necessarily those of SPEED.com, FOX, NewsCorp, or SPEED