Formula 1

Everything that happened in first Canadian GP F1 practice

by Jack Cozens
2 min read

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Formula 1 championship leader Max Verstappen headed Carlos Sainz in first practice for the Canadian Grand Prix, the first session in Montreal for three years.


Key moments:

> Verstappen loses time to rear rollbar issue but sets best time

> Ocon with front-right brake problem early in session

> Tsunoda whacks wall exiting Turn 8/9 chicane

> McLaren best of the rest with both cars


Red Bull driver Verstappen and team-mate Sergio Perez traded top spot on the first runs on medium tyres, though Perez’s best time of 1m15.660s stood as the benchmark for the first half of the session.

But Verstappen then pitted after reporting a problem, which team boss Christian Horner later disclosed was a rear rollbar issue, and Perez then failed to improve on his first attempt on soft tyres.

That opened the door for Sainz, who first split the Red Bulls then went fastest on a 1m15.441s as Perez found only a marginal improvement on his next run.

With his problem resolved, Verstappen returned to the track and duly set the fastest time of the session. His best time of 1m15.158s put him 0.246s clear of Sainz, who also improved again before the end of the session.

Fernando Alonso ended up third for Alpine ahead of Perez, with Charles Leclerc – whose Ferrari team has not yet decided to take a new turbo and therefore incur a penalty – fifth and George Russell sixth in the best of the Mercedes.

He and team-mate Lewis Hamilton were split by the Aston Martin of Lance Stroll, with his Aston Martin team-mate Sebastian Vettel ninth. Daniel Ricciardo completed the top 10 for McLaren.

Alex Albon were among the drivers to struggle in the braking zone for the final chicane early in the session, both taking to the runoff, while Alonso got close to the wall on the exit having successfully negotiated the corner.

Yuki Tsunoda was also fortunate to escape without more damage when he scraped the wall exiting the fast Turn 8/9 chicane.

He was called back to the pits by his AlphaTauri team but was back out on track before the end of the session and ended up 14th.

The second Alpine of Esteban Ocon lost time early on in FP1 with a significant front-right brake problem that required him to pit.

He got back out before the end of the session, and ended up 0.014s behind Tsunoda in 15th.

Practice 1 Results

Pos Name Car Best Time Gap Leader
1 Max Verstappen Red Bull 1m15.158s
2 Carlos Sainz Ferrari 1m15.404s +0.246s
3 Fernando Alonso Alpine-Renault 1m15.531s +0.373s
4 Sergio Pérez Red Bull 1m15.619s +0.461s
5 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 1m15.666s +0.508s
6 George Russell Mercedes 1m15.822s +0.664s
7 Lance Stroll Aston Martin-Mercedes 1m15.877s +0.719s
8 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1m15.877s +0.719s
9 Sebastian Vettel Aston Martin-Mercedes 1m16.041s +0.883s
10 Daniel Ricciardo McLaren-Mercedes 1m16.083s +0.925s
11 Pierre Gasly AlphaTauri-Red Bull 1m16.165s +1.007s
12 Lando Norris McLaren-Mercedes 1m16.211s +1.053s
13 Alex Albon Williams-Mercedes 1m16.308s +1.15s
14 Yuki Tsunoda AlphaTauri-Red Bull 1m16.322s +1.164s
15 Esteban Ocon Alpine-Renault 1m16.421s +1.263s
16 Valtteri Bottas Alfa Romeo-Ferrari 1m16.426s +1.268s
17 Guanyu Zhou Alfa Romeo-Ferrari 1m17.152s +1.994s
18 Mick Schumacher Haas-Ferrari 1m17.223s +2.065s
19 Nicholas Latifi Williams-Mercedes 1m17.241s +2.083s
20 Kevin Magnussen Haas-Ferrari 1m17.555s +2.397s
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