2012 Canadian Grand Prix – Sunday Race – Ferrari gamble fails as Hamilton takes victory

Lewis Hamilton won the Canadian Grand Prix after having started from second on the grid as a two-stop strategy paid good dividends compared to an ultimately failing one-stop strategy for Fernando Alonso. Having led the race after the second pit stops, Alonso decided to stay on the same tyres and that allowed Hamilton as well as three other drivers to go past him on newer tyres towards the latter laps of the race. Alonso eventually finished fifth.

Renault’s Romain Grosjean was another one-stopper but his fresher tyres enabled him to overtake Alonso for second place and so did the Sauber of Sergio Perez who finished third. Sebastian Vettel also stayed out on his second set of tyres but after Hamilton passed him, he came in for his second stop and fresher tyres enabled him to pass Alonso into fourth place, dropping the Ferrari into fifth.

Nico Rosberg finished sixth for Mercedes ahead of Mark Webber in seventh, Kimi Raikkonen in eight, Kamui Kobayashi in ninth and Felipe Massa in tenth. Michael Schumacher had yet another disastrous race as a failed DRS wing forced him to retire after lap forty five. The Force Indias finished just outside the points as the race didn’t quite come to fruition for them.

2011 Canadian Grand Prix – Saturday Qualifying – Vettel takes Pole, yet again

Sebastian Vettel has done it again! He clinched pole position for the Canadian Grand Prix at Montreal with a scintillatingly fast lap at the start of the third and final qualifying session. Ferrari occupy the next two positions as Fernando Alonso took P2 ahead of Felipe Massa in P3.

Mark Webber starts in P4 with Lewis Hamilton P5, Nico Rosberg P6, Jenson Button P7 and Michael Schumacher in P8 ahead of the two Renaults of Nick Heidfeld in P9 and Vitaly Petrov rounding off the top ten.

Ferrari had topped the timesheets in Q1 and Q2 as the less than usual dependence on low downforce at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve and also the reliance on Pirelli’s soft and super soft tyres suited their car better than others. But when it mattered, Vettel pulled out a quick lap which neither of the scarlet cars could overhaul and they had to make do with the second and third places on the grid.

McLaren will be disappointed at their performance with them now being the third fastest team, ahead of Mercedes and Renault. Hamilton has a good record in Montreal but fifth fastest was the best he could manage with Button sandwiched between the two Mercedes’.

2010 Canadian Grand Prix – Sunday Race – Hamilton nurses home a McLaren 1-2

Lewis Hamilton nursed his McLaren with badly grained tyres to victory at the Canadian Grand Prix and led home a McLaren 1-2 with Jenson Button finishing 2nd. Ferrari had a mini-resurgence of sorts with Fernando Alonso finishing 3rd. The Red Bulls had a rather sedate race, with Vettel finishing 4th and Mark Webber 5th. Nico Rosberg finished 6th with Robert Kubica behind him in 7th and Sebastian Buemi in 8th. Force India had both their cars in the points as Vitantonio Liuzzi led home teammate Adrian Sutil for the 9th and 10th places.

The tyre degradation issue that the teams feared all weekend did play a part in the race, with the front-runners electing for a two-stop strategy and the mid-tablers going for a three-stopper. Some teams even had to go for a four-stop strategy as they tyre graining was just too much to handle. The race delivered several overtaking manoeuvres and interesting incidents up and down the order but surprisingly, there was no Safety Car period to juice it up!

Before the race started, Mark Webber dropped down from P2 to P7 because of a gearbox change and that pushed up Sebastian Vettel to the front row, where he might have harboured hopes of a good clean start and get past pole-sitter Hamilton. But that was not to happen as almost all the front runners had a clean getaway, except Vitantonio Liuzzi and Felipe Massa, who had a tangling together and had to pit immediately for front wings and tyres. Michael Schumacher had a good start as he jumped upto 8th place from 13th on the grid. Other first lap incidents included a jump-start from Vitaly Petrov, which saw him take a drive-through penalty.

2010 Canadian Grand Prix – Saturday Qualifying – Hamilton breaks Red Bull’s stranglehold on Pole

F1 returned to the Gilles Villeneuve Circuit outside Montreal and Lewis Hamilton dominated the Saturday Qualifying sessions as he scored the fastest times in each sessions en route to wrapping up Pole position for the race. It was his third consecutive pole position at the Canadian Grand Prix – he had won from pole in 2007 and crashed into the back of Kimi Raikkonen in 2008.

Mark Webber will start 2nd with Sebastian Vettel 3rd. Ferrari seemed to be back on track with Fernando Alonso taking 4th place whereas Jenson Button could only manage 5th. Vitantonio Liuzzi scored his best quali position in 6th with Felipe Massa 7th, Robert Kubica 8th, Adrian Sutil 9th and Nico Rosberg completing the top ten.

Q1 got off to a sedate start with the top teams content to let the lesser ones take to the track and rubber it up nicely before making their move. Renault, Force India, Mercedes, Red Bull, Ferrari and McLaren all held P1 at some time or the other but as the clock wound down, it was the McLaren of Lewis Hamilton at the top of the timesheets, heading the Red Bull of Sebastian Vettel and the Ferrari of Fernando Alonso. Force India were the surprise team as both cars were in the top seven at one time. The ones to drop out at the end of the session were Kamui Kobayashi, Jarno Trulli, Heikki Kovalainen, Timo Glock, Lucas di Grassi, Bruno Senna and Karun Chandhok.

Q2 saw the times a-tumbling with the fastest times set in the range of the 1:15.5s and it was again the same drivers in the top three positions – Lewis Hamilton heading the charts, with Sebastian Vettel & Fernando Alonso behind him. Jenson Button almost didn’t make the cut but he salvaged that with a last-ditch lap that took him upto 8th fastest but one driver who didn’t get that lucky was seven-time winner Michael Schumacher, who could only manage the 12th fastest time. Joining him in the relegation were Rubens Barrichello, Nico Hulkenberg, Vitaly Petrov, Sebastian Buemi, Jaime Algersuari & Pedro de la Rosa.