Safety car, hard fights and strategic battles! The Canadian Grand Prix offered a lot, with 3 champions on the podium

Formula 1 has had a very interesting eighth race of this season. And it was definitely something to watch, both in terms of the necessary Safety Car exit and the strategic battles of the teams and drivers. Max Verstappen took another win, but behind him, things were happening…

The Canadian Grand Prix was the eighth round of this year’s Formula One season. Max Verstappen started Sunday’s race from first place, joined on the front row by Fernando Alonso.

Nico Hülkenberg was originally scheduled to start second, but he, along with other drivers, lost his position due to a penalty. So what did the order look like at the start of the Canadian Grand Prix?

The start of the Canadian Grand Prix

The vast majority of the starting field wore hard compound tyres at the start of the race. Sergio Pérez, Kevin Magnussen and Valtteri Bottas started on the medium compound, with only Pierre Gasly starting the Canadian Grand Prix on the soft compound.

After all five lights went out, Lewis Hamilton made a very decent start and a great drive, immediately moving into second place ahead of Alonso. Oscar Piastri moved into seventh ahead of teammate Lando Norris, with Pérez clearly struggling from the start.

Then, as early as lap eight, the fans in the stands and on the TV screens witnessed a virtual safety car. Logan Sargeant had to retire his car due to a technical fault. Four laps later, the classic Safety Car was on the track.

George Russell crashed into the wall and smashed his Mercedes monoposto. The pits got really wild, with many drivers wanting to use the Safety Car exit to change tyres.

Russell dropped to the very tail of the field, the sports commissioners had to deal with the dangerous pit stops of Norris and Hamilton. But no penalties were handed out.

Verstappen, Hamilton, Alonso, Leclerc, Sainz, Pérez, Magnussen, Bottas, Ocon, Norris – this is how the top ten points standings looked after 18 laps.

Beautiful, fierce battles and strategic battles

On lap 22, the fans saw a beautiful duel between the two champions when Alonso, after a great manoeuvre, overcame Hamilton in the last corner. At the stroke of the 28th circuit, the drivers started to go to their mechanics.

Before everyone else, Lance Stroll pitted and then moved up the order thanks to an early stop. Hülkenberg also tried a similar strategy, but both Haas drivers fell down the order during the Canadian GP.

A very good strategy by Ferrari. The drivers of the Maranello stable stopped only after lap 42, when they were the only ones racing on a medium set of tyres. But of course, after the pit stop, they changed to a hard set marked in white.

The final part of the Canadian Grand Prix

At the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, the battle was then mainly in the middle of the field. Anyway, Russell retired from the race on lap 55 due to his left front brake overheating.

Alexander Albon (Williams), seventh with around 15 laps to go, was doing a superb job. He started with a solid defensive performance, keeping four drivers behind him. It made for an interesting train of drivers, attractive to the unbiased fan’s eye.

Norris was fighting his way to the front, and at the end he tried to attack the eighth placed Esteban Ocon. However, a five-second penalty for unsportsmanlike conduct dropped him to 13th in the final standings. Stroll then passed Bottas on the home straight.

So what is the final standings for this year’s Canadian Grand Prix? Verstappen took the top spot, with Hamilton and Alonso rounding out the podium. Charles Leclerc finished fourth, Carlos Sainz (both Ferrari) fifth, Pérez sixth.

The Mexican Red Bull driver still set the fastest lap of the race at the end (1:14.481), thus scoring an extra championship point. Seventh place was defended by Albon, who was voted the best driver of the day.

Ocon crossed the line eighth, Stroll ninth and Bottas rounded out the top ten. Piastri finished eleventh, Gasly twelfth, Norris thirteenth, Júki Cunoda fourteenth, Hülkenberg fifteenth, Zhou Kuan-yü sixteenth, Magnussen seventeenth and Nyck De Vries eighteenth. Russell and Sargeant did not finish the Canadian Grand Prix.

Sources