Hamilton wins Italian Grand Prix after Rosberg slips

Lewis Hamilton fought back from a poor start to claim an emphatic victory at the Monza Formula One Sunday, moving to within 22 points of Mercedes teammate and title rival Nico Rosberg.

Rosberg had led early on, but the German had to settle for second when, coming under increasing pressure from Hamilton, he ceded the lead by out-braking himself heading into the first chicane.

Felipe Massa claimed his first podium for Williams in third, while teammate Valtteri Bottas fought back from his own tardy start - he dropped from third to 11th in the opening laps - to secure fourth ahead of Red Bull duo Daniel Ricciardo and Sebastian Vettel.

Hamilton had started the race by immediately dropping down the order as software issues hurt his getaway, enabling Rosberg to snatch the lead from McLaren's Kevin Magnussen and Massa.

The Briton's fightback from fourth was aided when Rosberg made a totally unforced error in the Rettifilo chicane at the start of lap nine, which cut his lead from 3.9 to 2.3 seconds.

Massa and Hamilton had already passed Magnussen on the fifth lap, with Hamilton then picking off Massa around the outside as the pair headed into the first chicane on Lap 10. After that, the chase was on.

Hamilton was advised to bide his time and wait for the end to attack, but decided his best chance was when his tyres were fresh and quickly set about cutting the gap, keen to put Rosberg under pressure and see what developed.

The answer came on the 29th lap when Rosberg made his second error at Rettifilo, and this time Hamilton went speeding by into a lead he would not relinquish.

Behind Massa, the fight for fourth was in doubt until the closing stages. Vettel seemed to have a lock on it for a while but he'd stopped for tyres as early as the 18th lap and thus was doomed when Bottas got into his stride in a great recovery.

The Finn would pick off Fernando Alonso's Ferrari, Jenson Button's McLaren, Sergio Perez's Force India, Vettel and - after a fierce fight - Magnussen to seal the position.

Third and fourth for Williams was a tremendous result, and moved the team ahead of Ferrari and into third in the constructors' standings.

Vettel kept going in fifth but was powerless to defend when team mate Daniel Ricciardo came rushing back up the field in one of the best drives of the afternoon.

The Australian had relatively fresher rubber, having pitted on the 26th lap, and took full advantage to dive down the inside of Vettel on the 47th lap.

Kimi Raikkonen lucked into a sorry ninth for Ferrari on a day when team mate Fernando Alonso's car let him down mechanically, with gearbox problems, for the first time this season.

Daniil Kvyat nearly snatched the final point after a super drive from 21st on the grid, but in the closing stages out-braked himself into the first chicane and only narrowly avoided Raikkonen before running straight on down the escape road, making two spectacular catches to keep his Toro Rosso out of the wall.

He finished 11th, ahead of Nico Hulkenberg's Force India, Jean-Eric Vergne's Toro Rosso, Pastor Maldonado's Lotus, Adrian Sutil's Sauber, and Romain Grosjean's Lotus.