JDJT does the talking. Higosh takes the win at Monza

JDJT did his talking off the track. Higosh did his on it.

After beating his team-mate on the last lap in Japan, JDJT had plenty to say about the fight ahead. “The fight is on”, he told IMS News; the constructors’ title was “Business as usual”. Higosh declined to comment. At Monza, he won the race, took a 19-point championship lead and helped finish the team’s title campaign.

Alezoo finished just 0.834 seconds behind, having given the Williams driver enough trouble to earn an appreciative message afterwards. JD was further back in sixth, furious about the collisions that had interrupted his recovery from 13th and convinced the afternoon had cost him the championship.

Seven days earlier, he had waited until the last lap to beat Higosh at Suzuka and draw level on points. Now he was asking the stewards to look at his encounters with McBeth and jazzy, while his team-mate enjoyed a 19-point advantage. Williams had won the title they were supposed to celebrate together on a day when JD could hardly have sounded less pleased.

Alezoo gets close enough to make it hurt

“Race of a lifetime. Still not P1 🤯😂”

Alezoo had started fourth and finished less than a second from victory, with more than seven seconds back to Zloober in third. Higosh knew exactly how much the Ferrari driver had put into it.

“yeah man i had to work hard to keep you behind”

For Alezoo, it continued a run that deserves attention beyond the Williams rivalry: a win in Qatar, fourth in Baku, third in Japan and now second at Monza. The leading pair may be deciding the championship between them, but they are having to contend with a Ferrari that keeps appearing near the front.

Higosh’s own sequence is harder still to fault. Since Las Vegas he has finished first, first, first, second, second, second and first again. His last result outside the top two was eighth at Silverstone.

Monza also brought him level with his team-mate on four D4 wins this season. This one came from second on the grid, McBeth having beaten him to pole by 0.136 seconds with a 1:18.849.

McBeth could not turn his first pole into a first win, finishing fifth behind jazzy. He was disappointed with the race but could at least tick one thing off the list.

“aye got my first pole so next step is a first win,” he wrote. “trust the process”.

With Higosh now 49 points ahead, there is not much time left for that process to deliver a championship challenge. McBeth is still mathematically in contention. Alezoo, despite his excellent race, is not: second left him 88 behind with only 64 available.

The patience that won Japan proves harder to find in traffic

JD had already identified the problem before either race. Asked ahead of Japan what would help him beat Higosh, he said he needed a good qualifying session so he could use his race pace to get out in front.

Thirteenth at Monza left him trying to do the opposite. He gained seven places, more than anyone else, but spent the afternoon attempting to reach a driver who had started on the front row.

“I had a shit quali so I was trying to push like mad to see if I could get near higosh,” he explained.

His report against McBeth covers their fights on laps 13 and 14, with JD alleging he was given too little room and then turned into, causing a half-spin. McBeth maintained that he had left space, even if he had made the pass awkward.

Four laps later, JD and jazzy collided. The Cadillac driver was frank about his part in it: “Jd sends it on the inside, I misjudged the corner and crash into him”. He also wondered why JD had tried the move through two tight right-handers with three straights and plenty of battery still available.

It was advice JD might have found easier to take without the other Williams to worry about. In Japan, he had been close enough to Higosh to choose his moment. From the midfield at Monza, he was still trying to earn that opportunity.

Jazzy then offered an unusual peace offering: he could report his own earlier incident with Higosh, if that would help. JD welcomed the idea.

That report is now open. Jazzy says contact at Turn 2 on lap six sent him off and cost him several places; Higosh says there was room and has supplied footage to support his defence. Alezoo’s 0.834-second deficit gives the case a direct bearing on the win. JD, who finished nearly 18 seconds behind his team-mate, may yet get some help from the Ferrari that finished right behind him.

Zloober finds a drive, then finds the podium

While the title contenders had spent the build-up discussing how to beat one another, Zloober was trying to establish whether he had somewhere to race.

“I had a drive then it disappeared,” he wrote before the session.

He lined up seventh for VCARB and finished third, more than four seconds ahead of jazzy. It was a fine return from an afternoon whose first obstacle had been getting into a car at all.

ELITE HEAT SHOW had made a late Mercedes appearance in Japan and scored nine points for finishing seventh. At Monza, his post-race conversation with Ceetee began with compliments about their racing and a save at pit entry, then turned to the soft tyres that EHS had not intended to select.

“I blew it!! I confirmed a tire stint and it put me on softs”.

He said they had been in the top five at one stage. Ceetee finished seventh; EHS was 13th and out of the points.

MrShiesty took eighth for Haas, though he rated his battery management as that “of a toddler”. Team-mate bigwoottz had rather less to laugh about after lap-two contact left him struggling and his race ended in retirement.

TheShrizzzler accepted that he had gone too deep into the first chicane and said he let bigwoottz back past. Their later collision is more disputed: Shrizz described a chain reaction as cars slowed ahead, while EHS said he was reacting to a sideways car. Bread, initially included in bigwoottz’s complaint, supplied footage showing he was ahead of the incident and received an apology for the mistaken identity.

Bread and Ceetee also settled their own lap-two disagreement privately and asked for that report to be closed.

TheShrizzzler finished ninth, ahead of Bread, geo and ash, who gained five places to take the final point. Malyspider was the other retirement after qualifying fifth for Audi. Ussh has reported his lap-nine crash at Parabolica as deliberate, saying it caused a virtual safety car, and requested a ban after malyspider left the server.

Williams have their trophy. Now comes the part Higosh promised

Before Japan, Higosh had described what winning the constructors’ championship would mean:

“Taking the constructors would mean gloves off for on track fighting, which has been close to none this season.”

They have already raced one another hard enough for Japan to sting. Monza has now removed the remaining mathematical business: Williams have 412 points, Red Bull 234, and only 110 more are available to a team. Eight wins from ten D4 races have left their rivals well short.

“Oh so me and higosh have won it,” JD wrote when the team standings appeared.

They had, with 41 points between them at Monza. How those points were divided will occupy JD rather more over the next two rounds.

Higosh can take the drivers’ title at Abu Dhabi. A win with JD fifth or lower would guarantee it regardless of the pole and fastest-lap bonuses. Reverse their Monza results, though, and JD would erase the 19-point gap before those bonuses are counted.

JD does not have to concede the championship yet. But after all the talk that followed Japan, Higosh has given him a result to answer at Abu Dhabi.

D4 Monza results · Championship standings