Mercedes junior George Russell extended his lead at the top of Formula 2's Drivers' Championship by claiming a fifth victory of the 2018 season at Monza.
Russell, who struggled for pace in Saturday's Feature Race after expressing a lack of confidence when under braking, started Sunday's 21-lap sprint from fifth on the grid, while Ralph Boschung started from pole position.
Having a slow getaway from the top spot, Boschung dropped through the field like a stone on the race start while fellow front-row starter Sergio Sette Camara also had a poor getaway from his grid box.
Starting from fourth on the grid, it was Nicholas Latifi who muscled his way through the pack to gain the lead while Russell powered through to immediately take second.
Lapping Monza as the fastest driver, Russell briefly took the lead from Latifi on lap 5 through the use of DRS, only to lock-up into Turn 1 and run deep into the corner, dropping back to third place after being overtaken by Russian Time's Artem Markelov because of the mistake.
One lap later, Markelov then passed Latifi for first, continuing his strong form from earlier in the weekend.
Maintaining the lead, Markelov seemed untouchable after Russell cleared Latifi on lap 9 before making a mistake into Turn 1 which caused him to take to the escape road, weaving in between Monza's polystyrene boards to avoid gaining an advantage.
Because of Markelov's mistake, Russell subsequently gained the lead, overtaking the Renault junior in Turn 3.
With longer gear ratios on his ART machine, Russell held a narrow lead over Markelov for the remainder of the race while the trailing Russian also suffered from an apparent engine issue.
On lap 21, Russell took the chequered flag to take his first victory since Austria while Markelov secured another podium finish for Russian Time. Sette Camara recovered to take third place for Carlin, still in search of his first win of the season.
Latifi dropped to fourth in the order, but nonetheless took a haul of eight points for DAMS, while Lando Norris slipped to fifth after starting in third place.
With Norris finishing down in fifth place, Russell successfully extended his lead in the Drivers' Championship, outscoring his rival Briton by nine points. 22 points separate the pair with two rounds of the season remaining.
Luca Ghiotto climbed from 10th on the grid to finish in sixth place for Campos Racing and was followed by Dorian Boccolacci, who grabbed his first points in the series after an eye-catching recovery drive from the back.
Jack Aitken completed the points-paying positions in eighth in the second ART Grand Prix car, climbing from 17th on the grid in an impressive driving performance.
Trident's Arjun Maini narrowly missed out on a points finish in ninth while Charouz Racing System's Antonio Fuoco completed the top 10, having been relegated to the back of the grid for the race start following his disqualification from Saturday's Feature Race.
Three drivers failed to see the chequered flag at Monza, with polesitter Boschung colliding with Prema Racing's Sean Gelael into Turn 4 while Alexander Albon suffered from an intermittent engine issue which halted his progress while on course for fifth.
