Lewis Hamilton enjoyed an utterly dominant Italian Grand Prix victory this afternoon to take a 53-point lead in the Formula One championship after Mercedes team mate and closest rival Nico Rosberg retired with his engine in flames.

A subsequent investigation over low tyre pressures cleared Mercedes. The stewards found that the tyres were initially inflated correctly, but pressure fell by the time the measurement was taken because the tyres had cooled down due to their warming blankets being unplugged.

Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel took second place, 25.042 seconds behind the reigning world champion, to give local fans something to cheer on a sunny afternoon at the team's home track.

Brazilian Felipe Massa took third for Williams, crossing the line 0.3 of a second ahead of his Finnish team mate Valtteri Bottas.

Rosberg had been chasing down Vettel when his engine burst into flames.

Hamilton's win was the 40th of Hamilton's career, one less than the career tally of his boyhood hero Ayrton Senna, and seventh of the season.

Near the end of the race Hamilton was told by his engineers to widen the gap to Vettel and not to ask questions. He promptly did so. The usual penalty for a tyre infringement is a 25 second deduction, although disqualification was a possibility.

Raikkonen had a dramatic race. He had a slow start from second and wound up last before mounting a recovery to fifth.

THE RESULT

1.   Lewis Hamilton (Britain)     Mercedes               1:18:00.688  
2.   Sebastian Vettel (Germany)   Ferrari                +00:25.042   
3.   Felipe Massa (Brazil)        Williams-Mercedes      00:47.635    
4.   Valtteri Bottas (Finland)    Williams-Mercedes      00:47.996    
5.   Kimi Raikkonen (Finland)     Ferrari                01:08.860    
6.   Sergio Perez (Mexico)        Force India - Mercedes 01:12.783    
7.   Nico Huelkenberg (Germany)   Force India - Mercedes 1 lap        
8.   Daniel Ricciardo (Australia) RedBull - Renault      1 lap        
9.   Marcus Ericsson (Sweden)     Sauber - Ferrari       1 lap        
10.  Daniil Kvyat (Russia)        RedBull - Renault      1 lap        
11.  Carlos Sainz Jr (Spain)      Toro Rosso - Renault   1 lap        
12.  Max Verstappen (Netherlands) Toro Rosso - Renault   1 lap        
13.  Felipe Nasr (Brazil)         Sauber - Ferrari       1 lap        
14.  Jenson Button (Britain)      McLaren                1 lap        
15.  Will Stevens (Britain)       Marussia - Ferrari     2 laps       
16.  Roberto Merhi (Spain)        Marussia - Ferrari     2 laps       
17r. Nico Rosberg (Germany)       Mercedes               3 laps       
18r. Fernando Alonso (Spain)      McLaren                6 laps       
r.   Pastor Maldonado (Venezuela) Lotus - Mercedes       52 laps      
r.   Romain Grosjean (France)     Lotus - Mercedes       52 laps

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