Vettel victorious in Canada

Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel scored his fifty Grand Prix victory with a commanding performance at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve.

By winning the Canadian Grand Prix, Vettel now leads the drivers’ championship by a single point over his rival Lewis Hamilton.

Vettel led every lap of the race, quickly building a comfortable lead over Valtteri Bottas and controlling the gap from there.

The most eventful part of Vettel’s race after that came at the start of the final lap, when the chequered flag was shown more than one lap early.

Vettel was aware enough of the error to complete the full distance at racing speed, although after he crossed the line at the end of the 70th and final lap, the race result was then based on positions at the end of lap 68.

Bottas’s main challenge from behind came at the start when a fast-starting Max Verstappen pulled alongside into Turn 1, but Bottas held onto the inside line for Turn 2 and forced the Red Bull driver to back out.

After that moment, which Verstappen was praised for by his team as he avoided getting caught up in an incident, the Red Bull driver was never able to mount another attack.

Bottas did have a minor scare with 15 laps to go, when he went wide at Turn 1 after lapping Carlos Sainz Jr’s Renault, and clipped the grass at Turn 2, briefly falling back behind the Renault.

Monaco Grand Prix winner Daniel Ricciardo claimed fourth position, taking advantage of difficulties for Lewis Hamilton early in the race to jump the Mercedes during the pitstops.

While the Red Bulls pitted earlier than the other leading cars were scheduled to due to starting the race on the hypersoft tyre, Hamilton also came in around the same time despite being on ultrasofts that should have been able to last much longer.

But he was forced into an early stop so Mercedes could attempt to rectify an engine problem, with the reigning world champion having reported “drop outs of power” early in the race.

After falling behind Ricciardo during those pitstops, Hamilton was then vulnerable to Kimi Raikkonen’s Ferrari also getting ahead of him when The Iceman stopped much later in the race, but he hung on to fifth place as Raikkonen emerged from the pits just behind him at Turn 2.

Despite having tyres that were 16 laps fresher than Hamilton’s, Raikkonen couldn’t mount a challenge and gradually fell back from the Mercedes.

Mercedes offered Hamilton the option of turning down his engine in the closing laps, but he declined – instead pressuring Ricciardo and getting to within a second of the Red Bull.

Hamilton got close at the hairpin with four laps to go, but was unable to attempt a pass down the following straight after having a big slide in the middle of the corner, and he then lost further time on the following lap stuck behind Sergey Sirotkin’s Williams.

Behind the leading cars, Renault took a one-two finish in the ‘class B’ race, with Nico Hulkenberg leading home Sainz to claim seventh and eighth for the team.

Esteban Ocon, who was ahead of both Renaults early in the race, was the first car to make a scheduled pitstop, and he lost out to Hulkenberg and Sainz having been holding them up before he suffered a slow pitstop, which relegated him to ninth.

Ocon came back at the Renaults in the closing stages of the race, prompting Renault to ask Hulkenberg to pick up the pace to prevent Sainz coming under attack.

The final point went to Charles Leclerc, who inherited tenth when Fernando Alonso retired with an exhaust problem.

The Sauber driver headed Alonso early in the race but he lost out to the McLaren during the pitstops, only to reclaim the position when Alonso came into the pits again to retire.

This was a disappointing end for the double world champion. Fernando Alonso celebrated his 300th Grand Prix at Canada but after a difficult qualifying session – only P14 – this race was challenging for the McLaren driver. To drop out was pure heartbreak.

The only other drivers not to finish were Brendon Hartley and home driver Lance Stroll, who crashed in spectacular fashion at Turn 5 on the opening lap.

Stroll got out of shape through the fast right-hand kink, squeezing Hartley, who was on his left, between the Williams and the tyre barrier, briefly launching the Toro Rosso into the air.

After being examined at the medical centre, Hartley was then sent to hospital for further checks.

So not the most exciting Canadian Grand Prix with the most dramatic moment on lap one involving a crash between the Williams and Toro Rosso.

Congratulations to Sebastian Vettel in winning the race and claiming a Ferrari victory at Canada since 2004, when Michael Schumacher triumphed for the Scuderia.

There’s a single championship point separating Vettel and Hamilton as Formula 1 heads to a new event, the French Grand Prix at Paul Ricard. Roll on the title fight.

Canadian Grand Prix, race results:
1 Sebastian Vettel Ferrari 68 1h28m31.377s
2 Valtteri Bottas Mercedes 68 7.376s
3 Max Verstappen Red Bull-Renault 68 8.360s
4 Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull-Renault 68 20.892s
5 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 68 21.559s
6 Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari 68 27.184s
7 Nico Hulkenberg Renault 67 1 Lap
8 Carlos Sainz Renault 67 1 Lap
9 Esteban Ocon Force India-Mercedes 67 1 Lap
10 Charles Leclerc Sauber-Ferrari 67 1 Lap
11 Pierre Gasly Toro Rosso-Honda 67 1 Lap
12 Romain Grosjean Haas-Ferrari 67 1 Lap
13 Kevin Magnussen Haas-Ferrari 67 1 Lap
14 Sergio Perez Force India-Mercedes 67 1 Lap
15 Marcus Ericsson Sauber-Ferrari 66 2 Laps
16 Stoffel Vandoorne McLaren-Renault 66 2 Laps
17 Sergey Sirotkin Williams-Mercedes 66 2 Laps
– Fernando Alonso McLaren-Renault 40 Exhaust
– Lance Stroll Williams-Mercedes 0 Collision
– Brendon Hartley Toro Rosso-Honda 0 Collision

Drivers’ standings:
1 Sebastian Vettel 121
2 Lewis Hamilton 120
3 Valtteri Bottas 86
4 Daniel Ricciardo 84
5 Kimi Raikkonen 68
6 Max Verstappen 50
7 Fernando Alonso 32
8 Nico Hulkenberg 32
9 Carlos Sainz 24
10 Kevin Magnussen 19
11 Pierre Gasly 18
12 Sergio Perez 17
13 Esteban Ocon 11
14 Charles Leclerc 10
15 Stoffel Vandoorne 8
16 Lance Stroll 4
17 Marcus Ericsson 2
18 Brendon Hartley 1
19 Romain Grosjean 0
20 Sergey Sirotkin 0

Constructors’ standings:
1 Mercedes 206
2 Ferrari 189
3 Red Bull-Renault 134
4 Renault 56
5 McLaren-Renault 40
6 Force India-Mercedes 28
7 Toro Rosso-Honda 19
8 Haas-Ferrari 19
9 Sauber-Ferrari 12
10 Williams-Mercedes 4

5 thoughts to “Vettel victorious in Canada”

  1. Canadian Grand Prix race review as reported by Formula1.com.

    Ferrari haven’t won in Montreal since 2004, while Lewis Hamilton has made Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve his own during his F1 career. But Sebastian Vettel ripped up the form book with a dominant victory in the Canadian Grand Prix on Sunday to snatch the lead in the 2018 driver standings…

    The German was mighty in qualifying on Saturday and didn’t put a foot wrong come race day, crossing the line 5.7 seconds clear of Mercedes’ Valtteri Bottas, with Red Bull’s Max Verstappen completing the podium, followed home by team mate Daniel Ricciardo and the second Mercedes of Hamilton.

    Vettel, whose Ferrari team brought an engine update to Montreal, had a slow start to the weekend but finally found his rhythm in qualifying and the result was a stunning pole position. That form then carried into Sunday as he led the field away from pole position at the race start.

    Bottas fought off the fast-starting Verstappen to retain second, moments before the race was neutralised when Toro Rosso’s Brendon Hartley and Williams’ Lance Stroll collided spectacularly. Stroll felt he had a puncture, lost control of his car momentarily and that speared him into Hartley, squeezing the Kiwi up against the barrier.

    Both retired on the spot, sparking a Safety Car period. At the restart, Vettel had no trouble keeping Bottas and the hypersoft-tyred Verstappen at bay and promptly proceeded to pull out a gap. His title rival Hamilton wasn’t having so much luck. The reigning world champion reported a problem with power.

    Mercedes responded by pitting him early, despite the Briton starting on the more durable ultrasoft tyres, so they could apply a fix to what transpired to be a problem with cooling. It seemed to do the trick, but that put Hamilton at a strategic disadvantage and he dropped a place to fifth behind Ricciardo after the Australian made his stop.

    Vettel, Bottas and Kimi Raikkonen ran very deep into the race. That worked out nicely for Vettel and Bottas, as they retained the top two positions, but Raikkonen wasn’t so lucky and dropped back to sixth for Ferrari. At one point, it looked like we might have had a battle for the lead as Bottas cut the deficit to Vettel.

    But the Finn ran wide exiting Turn 1 and his challenge evaporated. His focus then switched to defending to the fast-finishing Verstappen. Meanwhile, Hamilton attacked Ricciardo until the chequered flag, but he didn’t deal with traffic as well as Ricciardo and ultimately had to settle for fifth.

    Nico Hulkenberg was the best of the rest, as he has so often been this season, in seventh, a fraction ahead of Renault team mate Carlos Sainz, who survived contact with Force India’s Sergio Perez on the rundown to Turn 1.

    Perez’s team mate Esteban Ocon scored points for only the third time this season in ninth, while Charles Leclerc scored the final point – his third points-finish in four races – for Sauber.

    Toro Rosso’s Pierre Gasly delivered a strong recovery drive to 11th, having started 19th following a grid penalty for an engine change, with Romain Grosjean 12th, beating his Haas team mate Kevin Magnussen despite starting dead last.

    There wasn’t a happy end to Fernando Alonso’s 300th Grand Prix weekend. The double world champion had fought his way into the points after a poor qualifying, but was instructed to retire his McLaren when the team identified an exhaust problem. Team mate Stoffel Vandoorne didn’t fare much better as he ended up 16th.

    Williams may have had something to smile about when they won F1’s Raft Race on Saturday evening, but fortunes reverted to 2018-type on Sunday, as local favourite Stroll retired on lap one and Sergey Sirotkin was the last of the classified runners.

    At the other end of the spectrum, Ferrari regained the momentum in the championship battle, with Vettel turning a 14-point deficit to Hamilton into a one-point lead, while Ferrari closed the gap to leaders Mercedes to 17 points heading to the next race in France.

  2. Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel feared track invasion when the chequered flag was waved early. Motorsport.com has the full story.

    Canadian Grand Prix winner Sebastian Vettel said he was worried Formula 1 fans would run onto the track when the chequered flag was waved before the end of the race.

    The result of the grand prix was taken from lap 68 instead of 70 after model Winnie Harlow waved the flag early, with Vettel passing it for the first time at the end of the penultimate lap.

    Harlow said she was “just following instructions”, and Vettel said he sent a radio message about the flag being waved early in the hope it would prevent any confusion.

    “Fortunately we had radio, fortunately we had the lap counter in the car, and the pit board was accurate,” said Vettel.

    “But if you lose radio and maybe the pit board is not there, then you back off, and being in the lead, you hope all the others back off as well!

    “I was just worried, I told them on the last lap, so people don’t jump on the track, waving flags and celebrating, because we are still going at full pace.

    “I even watched on TV [on a trackside big screen] and after I saw the chequered flag it said ‘FINAL LAP’ [on the TV graphics], so then I was a bit confused.

    “I told them that I think the race isn’t over yet, and they said, ‘no no no, keep pushing’.

    “Some of the marshals were already celebrating – they peaked a bit early.”

    The incident meant Sergio Perez, who had passed Kevin Magnussen for 13th on that was supposed to be the penultimate lap, was relegated back to 14th – while Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo lost fastest lap honours to teammate Max Verstappen.

    Vettel’s teammate Kimi Raikkonen slowed down after the flag was shown in error, according to Carlos Sainz Jr, who had been lapped by the Finn.

    “I lost four or five seconds, because Kimi saw it and was slowing down in front of me,” said Sainz, who finished eighth for Renault.

    “Then he saw it was not the chequered flag and he picked up the pace again.

    “I arrived to Turn 2 and all the marshals were waving the flags – I knew they were wrong, I didn’t slow down, but Kimi did in front.

    “I didn’t see the chequered flag, because I wasn’t looking at it, and I didn’t expect it.”

    Pierre Gasly, who finished 11th, said having the flag come out early was “risky”.

    “I think it is the first time I took the chequered flag two times at the same race,” he said. “I don’t know exactly what’s happened, but my engineer told me, ‘OK, don’t pay attention to that’.

    “But that is really risky, because if you lift off after the first one and then everyone passes you… I was a bit surprised.

    “The team told me five seconds before, so it was pretty close timing. He told me ‘next one is the last lap’, then I pass [the line] and I saw the flag and I was like, ‘what the f**k?’”

  3. This was a challenging race for Mercedes and team boss Toto Wolff admits the outfit needs to ‘wake up’ to reality after losing to rival Ferrari for victory. Motorsport.com has the details.

    Mercedes boss Toto Wolff says his team needs to “wake up” after its defeat in the Canadian Grand Prix – as he suggested there could be consequences for a weekend of errors.

    With Sebastian Vettel’s dominant victory putting him back on top of the Formula 1 championship standings, Wolff appeared upset about the way things had played out on a track where Mercedes had been expected to dominate.

    Speaking to Austrian channel ORF, Wolff said that there was nothing positive to take away from the result – as he brushed off suggestions Valtteri Bottas’s second placed finish was damage limitation.

    “Not at all. It is a shit result for us,” said Wolff. “I have to put it like that. It is a strong track for us, but all weekend long we did little mistakes, from the beginning on.

    “The only feeling I have is that we have to wake up.

    “We fall behind in every aspect. This is a track where we should have maximised points. It was not about performing damage limitation.”

    When asked if there would be consequences as the result of what had happened, Wolff said: “That’s necessary…We will look at that internally.”

    Mercedes’ weekend was hurt by it being forced to delay the introduction of its new engine because of reliability concerns, plus a poor tyre choice that left it limited with the number of hypersoft it had at its disposal.

    In the race, Lewis Hamilton was also slowed by an engine cooling issue which triggered an early pitstop so the team could make changes to help solve the problem.

    Non-executive chairman Niki Lauda told Sky that Mercedes had to acknowledge the job that Ferrari had done to help Vettel dominate.

    “First of all we could not use our new engine, which is part of it,” he said. “But we have to say that Ferrari as a package is unbelievable.

    “The car is fantastic and the engine – and even on fuel consumption they have been going [like] hell all through the race.

    “So I think we have to really work hard now. Red Bull was a surprise but in the end they were behind. So that is it.”

  4. Red Bull’s Daniel Ricciardo commented that he was struggling with the upgraded Renault engine during the Canadian Grand Prix. Motorsport.com has the news story.

    Daniel Ricciardo has revealed that he struggled to get as much from Renault’s upgraded Formula 1 engine as Red Bull teammate Max Verstappen during the Canadian Grand Prix weekend.

    Renault introduced a new engine for all six cars in Canada, but Monaco GP winner Ricciardo trailed teammate Verstappen throughout practice, qualifying and the race.

    He was able to beat Lewis Hamilton to fourth and finish one place and 12s behind Verstappen, but said the new engine did not have a completely positive impact on his RB14.

    Speaking to Sky Sports F1, Ricciardo said: “We had the upgrade this weekend and my car struggled more with the driveability, the calibration.

    “It could have been better, let’s say that. I was just struggling to keep the tyres under control with that driveability.

    “I would say it explains some of the inconsistency. But also Max was driving really well all weekend, so I won’t take that away from him.”

    Ricciardo had to use an older MGU-K this weekend after his component failed during his Monaco victory.

    Red Bull opted to revert to one already in the pool instead of sacrificing a good starting position for a new part, which would have sparked a grid penalty.

    It paid off with Ricciardo’s drive to fourth, which keeps Ricciardo in a reasonable position as a title outsider even though he has dropped to fourth behind Valtteri Bottas.

    He said he expected to be hit sooner rather than later with a grid drop but admitted he was “still not sure” when Red Bull would need a new MGU-K from Renault.

    “I’m pretty happy we got through the whole weekend,” he said.

    “We got some good points, I believe we gained two points in the championship because we got Lewis [who lost the lead to race winner Sebastian Vettel.

    “We’ll see what happens. It’ll bite us soon, we’ll try to stay on top while we can.”

    Ricciardo trails new championship leader Vettel by 37 points, having been 38 from the summit before the race when Hamilton was still on top.

    He said that minor improvement is a small victory at a power-sensitive track that Red Bull expected to struggle at more thanks to its underpowered Renault engine.

    “I’m relatively content for a fourth place,” said Ricciardo. “We did all we could. For us to take a few points away is a little win, and gives us a lot of encouragement.”

  5. Brendon Hartley has been given a clean bill of health after being taken to hospital for tests after his huge crash on the first lap of Formula 1’s Canadian Grand Prix.

    The Toro Rosso driver clashed with Lance Stroll through Turn 5 on the opening lap when trying to pass the Williams driver on the outside.

    Stroll had a wobble that forced him into Hartley and sent the New Zealander into the tyre barrier, launching him into the air briefly and sending both drivers down the run-off on the entry to the Turn 6/7 chicane.

    Both drivers were sent to the medical centre after the crash, with Hartley then taken to hospital nearby by helicopter for further investigations.

    He underwent two electrocardiogram tests, which the FIA said have been completed and the results are normal.

    Hartley is due to return to the circuit by helicopter.

    Stroll conducted his normal post-race media activities after his trip to the medical centre and described it as a racing incident.

    “I had a good start and I gained a few positions,” he said.

    “I was side-by-side with Brendon going into Turn 5, the car got loose on me and I corrected it, but there was not much room for both of us.

    “By the time I corrected it, we touched and went into the wall.”

    The stewards agreed with Stroll’s assessment and a brief in-race investigation ended in no action being taken.

    Source: Motorsport.com

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