F1 Talk: A Controversial Canadian Classic Analysed

The 2019 Canadian Grand Prix will be a weekend to remember in years to come. Sebastian Vettel went toe to toe with Lewis Hamilton before it all went wrong when he made a mistake, cut the chicane and came back onto the track in what the stewards deemed to be an “unsafe” manner.

Then, it all went a bit WWE when Vettel initially refused to go to the podium before switching the P1 and P2 signs below the podium. It was incredible what was happening and if people were not talking about F1 prior to Sunday, people definitely were (and still are) afterwards.

Before we get into the race, go back to Friday.

In my preview, I thought Ferrari would be closer to Mercedes but after the first practice session things did not look good. Mercedes were nearly one second clear of the rest of the field and it looked all but over. But, because they bought a new power unit to Canada they ran the engine much harder than normal for a first practice session so the gap to the rest of the field was exaggerated.

Ferrari showed good pace in the second practice session, topping the timing sheets whilst Hamilton made an uncharacteristic error by losing the rear and hitting the wall – ending his session early.

Saturday produced the best qualifying session of the season so far with plenty of drama throughout each knockout phase. Max Verstappen got knocked out in Q2 after he could not find a good time on the medium compound tyres, meaning he would have to use the soft tyres to progress to Q3 whereas Mercedes and Ferrari were able to progress on the medium tyres.

In F1, the tyres you set your fastest time on in Q2 are the same tyres you start the Grand Prix on (if you get into Q3).

Red Bull took a risk by sending Verstappen out late meaning if a car in front of him caused a yellow or red flag, he would not be able to set an adequate time, putting him out of qualifying. This very thing happened when Kevin Magnussen went spearing into the wall after hitting the Wall of Champions with the rear of his car, bringing out a red flag and ending the session.

Red Bull and Verstappen would have had more than enough pace to progress so should have set a time on the soft tyres earlier (or at least send him out ahead of the queue of cars). Verstappen would start down in 9th when he should have been at least on the second row.

In Q3, a stunning lap from Vettel gave him his first pole position since July last year in Germany. It was one of the best laps of his career. In a way, the lap came from nowhere with Mercedes looking like they were going to simply turn things up when it really mattered and lock out the front row. Hamilton’s lap was good too and we were all set for a thriller with Vettel and Hamilton on the front row.

The top positions stayed line a stern with neither of the big names gaining or losing places on the opening lap. A very interesting fact is that just once in the last 12 Canadian Grand Prix, has the pole sitter not lead after turn one. It must be due to the geometry of the track – it is the third shortest run down to turn one of the year and it does curve slightly towards the braking zone meaning the cars tend to go single file and it is easy for the leader to defend too.

The top three cars (Vettel, Hamilton and Charles Leclerc) gapped the rest of the field as the race progressed even though they were not initially pushing at 100%. Vettel pitted first to cover off any undercut threat from Hamilton as the pace started to ramp up before the pitstops.

Hamilton waited two laps before he pitted and came out around 4.5 seconds behind. Leclerc was left out for an extra five laps as Ferrari gave him another sub-optimal strategy. To be fair to Ferrari, had he pitted any earlier he would have came out behind Verstappen which would be far from ideal, plus a safety car or VSC would have put Leclerc right in play.

It was Hamilton vs. Vettel. There was no messing around as the pace got faster and faster with Hamilton wanting to push Vettel hard. Both drivers were right on the limit with Hamilton making 4-5 big mistakes into the hairpin, costing him around half a second each time. But, he had the pace to catch back up to Vettel and the intensity was high.

The pressure got to Vettel yet again, and just like in Bahrain against Hamilton – the four-time world champion made a mistake. Now, if you want to hear my very in-depth opinion then check out one of my latest articles in this link: Why Vettel deserved a penalty? 

What was great about this though is that it showed that both champions were on the edge of everything. They weren’t qualifying style laps but it felt very similar to the 2017 Spanish GP which saw Hamilton and Vettel pushing very hard with Hamilton coming out on top in that one, one of my favourite races in the turbo-hybrid era because of the intensity of the fight.

Due to the penalty, we were robbed of a potential thrilling climax with Hamilton and Vettel having a proper wheel to wheel battle. Something I feel we have not had enough of in the last few years.

Vettel was bitterly angry and irritated to say the least and he was initially not going to go onto the podium. The cameraman who followed Vettel did a sensational job of getting just meters away from Vettel, everywhere he went from the FIA weighbridge, the Ferrari motorhome, through the Mercedes garage and then capturing the moment when Vettel swapped the P1 and P2 signs below the podium.

The Netflix team filming for the second series of F1’s Drive to Survive must have been buzzing. It is understandable what Vettel did and I don’t blame him. He has not won a race since Belgium in August last year but his actions post-race distracted many from the error he made in the race.

There is a genuine respect between Hamilton and Vettel and we saw this in the cool-down room and the podium, even if things were slightly awkward. We can only hope that the battle that was ended abruptly in Canada can continue in the near future.

Meanwhile, Renault had one of their best weekends in F1 since their return to the sport in 2016. Daniel Ricciardo stuck his car on the second row and was able to fight a poor Valtteri Bottas. Nico Hulkenberg was equally impressive in the race, maintaining an excellent pace on old, soft tyres. Renault told Hulkenberg to not attack Ricciardo at the end, understandable as the 14 points Renault scored in Montreal will be precious come Abu Dhabi and they won’t want to allow something stupid to happen.

Renault actually had great pace in Monaco too but bad luck and a wrong strategy call meant they could not reap the awards. This development and increase in pace is exactly what they needed going to their home race in France in over a week’s time.

Haas had one of those weekend’s with Kevin Magnussen suffering from a big driver error which ruined his and teammate Romain Grosjean’s qualifying and race. Gunther Steiner was forced to intervene on the radio after Magnussen’s unnecessary team radio comments. I can’t help but feel that Haas should not have stuck with their line-up for 2019. I thought they would not and replace one of their drivers. Both Magnussen and Grosjean are inconsistent and seem to have bad weekend’s when the car is capable of points – exactly what you do not want for a midfield team.

Lance Stroll was eliminated from Q1 again but he was much closer to Sergio Perez than he has been all year and then went on to have an excellent race. His pace in the opening stint was what gave him 9th place, the same result he has had twice this year in Australia and Azerbaijan. If he can just improve qualifying, he is capable of scoring points every weekend with race performances like the one had on Sunday.

To conclude then I just want to say that whilst Vettel’s actions post-race probably helped F1 get noticed for the first time this year, the hardcore, pure racing fans lost out. Its not often we get a battle for the lead which looks like is going to go down to the final laps and I’m sure we would have had that, had Vettel not made that mistake or a different penalty was given. I hope we will see a continuation of what we got in Canada as it was by far F1’s best weekend of 2019.