Championhip leader Lewis Hamilton achieved his 44th career pole position in Formula 1 – driving car number 44, recording his fourth P1 at the Circuit Gilles Villenuve.
Hamilton edged out his Mercedes team-mate Nico Rosberg with a margin of three tenths, while Kimi Raikkonen had to settle with third position for Ferrari.
Rosberg described the conclusion to his qualifying session as “rubbish”, even though he was very competitive in Q1 and Q2.
The Silver Arrows duo were the only drivers to lap below one minute, 15 seconds around Montreal’s race track, and Hamilton’s one minute, 14.393 seconds lap on their first runs in Q3 stood as pole when neither he nor Rosberg improved on their second run.
With Vettel relegated to P16 due to a suspected MGU-H problem, Kimi Raikkonen was the sole Scuderia representative in the top ten shootout.
The 2007 world champion had a big moment exiting Turn 4 on his best lap but it was still reasonable to land third on the grid.
Fellow Finn Valtteri Bottas managed a big improvement on his final run to join The Iceman on row two for Williams and edge out the impressive Lotus pair of Romain Grosjean and Pastor Maldonado.
Force India’s Nico Hulkenberg produced his best qualifying effort of the season to grab seventh, comfortably beating both Red Bulls and team-mate Sergio Perez, who rounded out the top ten.
Daniil Kvyat got the better of team-mate Daniel Ricciardo by less than a tenth to be best of the Red Bulls in eighth position.
Carlos Sainz Jr was highest placed of those to miss out in Q3 by just 0.036 seconds in a tight fight in Q2.
His Toro Rosso team-mate Max Verstappen was P12, but the 17-year-old will start last on account of a 15-place grid drop for a combination of driving standards and engine penalities.
Verstappen was just 0.017 seconds faster than Marcus Ericsson, who was P13 and well clear of Sauber team-mate Felipe Nasr.
Jenson Button’s engine problem in final practice forced him to skip qualifying, which meant only four cars were eliminated in Q1.
Vettel was not impressive to find out he was only P16. Swearing on the team radio. The Malaysian Grand Prix winner was over three tenths adrift of Alonso’s McLaren as he limped around significantly down on power.
Felipe Massa was the other shock loser in Q1, half a second further back.
The Williams driver complained of a lack of power from his Mercedes engine and he could do no better than P17.
The Manor Marussias were predictably the slowest of the cars that ran in qualifying.
Roberto Merhi was best of the two for the first time this season with a time just 0.024 seconds faster than team-mate Will Stevens.
Canadian Grand Prix, qualifying positions:
1 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1m14.393s
2 Nico Rosberg Mercedes 1m14.702s
3 Kimi Raikkonen Ferrari 1m15.014s
4 Valtteri Bottas Williams-Mercedes 1m15.102s
5 Romain Grosjean Lotus-Mercedes 1m15.194s
6 Pastor Maldonado Lotus-Mercedes 1m15.329s
7 Nico Hulkenberg Force India-Mercedes 1m15.614s
8 Daniil Kvyat Red Bull-Renault 1m16.079s
9 Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull-Renault 1m16.114s
10 Sergio Perez Force India-Mercedes 1m16.338s
11 Carlos Sainz Toro Rosso-Renault 1m16.042s
12 Marcus Ericsson Sauber-Ferrari 1m16.262s
13 Fernando Alonso McLaren-Honda 1m16.276s
14 Felipe Nasr Sauber-Ferrari 1m16.620s
15 Sebastian Vettel Ferrari 1m17.344s
16 Felipe Massa Williams-Mercedes 1m17.886s
17 Roberto Merhi Marussia-Ferrari 1m19.133s
18 Will Stevens Marussia-Ferrari 1m19.157s
19 Max Verstappen Toro Rosso-Renault 1m16.245s*
20 Jenson Button McLaren-Honda No time
*15-place grid penalty
Carlos Sainz Jr feels the Canadian Grand Prix will be Toro Rosso’s hardest race of the 2015 Formula 1 season.
Sainz starts 11th at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Montreal, but with the Renault engine in his Toro Rosso lacking performance, he is fully expecting the race to be “very tricky”.
“We obviously have a power deficit that makes it very difficult to overtake and very easy to be overtaken here,” said Sainz.
“Also with the lack of downforce we are running on the car it is not ideal for tyre degradation, so I expect the toughest race of the season.
“Everything says points will be more difficult than ever, but we’re going to fight for it.
We’re going to try something clever, something different, and let’s see what we can do.”
Team-mate Max Verstappen starts at the back of the grid due to his cumulation of penalties.
Verstappen went into qualifying knowing he faced a drop of 15 places, taking a five-position hit for being at fault for a crash with Romain Grosjean in the Monaco Grand Prix, and the further 10 for taking a fifth engine for this season.
With Verstappen qualifying 12th and only able to drop eight places, the remainder of the penalty will be a 10-second stop/go during the race.
“I will just deal with it and try to make the best of it,” said Verstappen.
“Now I will also have a 10-second penalty, so it means I’m going to have to do some overtaking.
“Hopefully a safety car will help us a bit, so we will try and see we what can do from there. Anything is possible.
“It will be hard to overtake on the straights, but hopefully the race pace will be good so we can get close.”
Source: Autosport.com
Canadian Grand Prix race stewards are investigating Sebastian Vettel over a red flag pass during free practice session three. Autosport.com has the details.
Ferrari Formula 1 driver Sebastian Vettel has been summoned to the Canadian Grand Prix stewards regarding an overtaking move under red flags in practice.
Vettel admitted he had passed a Manor during the second Saturday morning stoppage, but did not feel he had done anything wrong.
“There was a red flag at the time, I saw the Manor; I don’t know what the problem was with him, he was going quite slow and I passed him,” said Vettel before heading to the stewards’ office.
It comes on a disappointing day for the four-time world champion, who failed to make it out of the first part of qualifying.
He came back to the Ferrari pit after his out-lap with a lack of power, and efforts to rectify it proved unsuccessful.
Vettel was sent back out in the hope he could still make it to Q2, but was only 16th fastest.
“We had problems where we couldn’t get the full power so obviously we were losing a lot on the straights, which is a shame,” said Vettel.
“We tried to get into to Q2 and maybe buy us some time but it didn’t work and in the end it wouldn’t make a difference.
“I don’t think it’s anything to do with the engine. It’s more the electronic side.
“I’m sure we can fix the problem and then we can have a good race tomorrow.”
Ferrari had high hopes for a strong result this weekend after it used three of its engine token allocation for an upgrade ahead of the Montreal race.
While team-mate Kimi Raikkonen qualified third, behind the two Mercedes, Vettel will start 15th after Max Verstappen’s 15-place penalty is applied.
UPDATE: Sebastian Vettel has a five-place grid penalty. News report from Autosport.com.
Formula 1 stewards have given Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel a five-place grid penalty and three penalty points on his licence for overtaking under red flags in Canadian Grand Prix practice.
Vettel was already only 15th on the grid having struggled with a power-sapping problem in Q1.
He was summoned to the stewards for passing Roberto Merhi’s Manor during the late red flag in practice three prompted when Jenson Button’s McLaren ground to a halt on the exit of Turn 7.
Vettel was following Merhi back to the pits when he overtook the rookie on the long straight towards the final chicane.
Although Vettel had argued that the Manor appeared to have a problem as it was moving at such a slow speed, the officials felt a penalty was necessary.
His will be among several penalties affecting the Montreal F1 grid and race.
Max Verstappen, who was 12th fastest, faces a combined grid demotion of 15 places between his five-spot penalty for colliding with Romain Grosjean in Monaco and a further 10 for exceeding his 2015 engine allocation.
Button – who was unable to run at all in qualifying – also believes he will have to take a penalty due to the repairs being carried out on his McLaren following its practice failure.
McLaren racing director Eric Boullier concedes the Formula 1 team needs to improve everywhere following another day of failure with engine partner Honda at the Canadian Grand Prix.
Fernando Alonso and Jenson Button are now on their fourth and final engine after both cars required a change ahead of qualifying in Montreal.
Button’s problems were so severe the 2009 world champion failed to take part in qualifying, while Alonso at least managed 14th and moves up a place for the start due to Toro Rosso’s Max Verstappen taking a penalty.
The failures came a day after Honda chief Yasuhisa Arai told AUTOSPORT the use of tokens had improved the power unit and provided optimism going into the weekend.
Asked about the areas required for development, a succinct Boullier initially said: “Everywhere.”
He then added: “If you want to win you have to be the best in terms of aerodynamics, vehicle dynamics, chassis, driveability, so we have to improve everywhere.
“We are lacking downforce to be at the front, [to have] let’s say a top chassis, so we have to work on this to make the car better.”
With McLaren hosting its shareholders from Bahrain and in Mansour Ojjeh this weekend, pressure from above would be understandable.
Yet Boullier added: “There is pressure, but that’s normal.
“We are all competitors and we want to win and be competitive, so there is pressure on Honda, pressure on McLaren.
“With the shareholders, like any company in the world, they visit us, they provide us with good support, but also they understand.
“We have a duty to report, which is also normal, so we don’t have this external pressure.
“We are professional and transparent enough, so they know what we are doing, and I hope we know what we’re doing as well.”
Arai, meanwhile, described the events of the day as “not satisfying and very sad”.
With Alonso’s car a fault was discovered inside the engine, necessitating a change, while with Button ERS problems were found, leading to damage inside the system and another replacement.
Source: Autosport.com