George Russell surprisingly secured pole position in a dramatic finish in qualifying for the Grand Prix of Canada 2025. In the second attempt in Q3, the Mercedes pilot improved from 3rd place to number 1 and referred Max Verstappen (Red Bull) and Oscar Piatri (McLaren) by 0.160 and 0.221 seconds to places 2 and 3.
After the first Q3 run, Verstappen was still in the lead, but both Russell and Verstappen drove their last attack on the harder medium tire and were able to grow again. In the end, the times tumbled, and it first led Piatri, then stappen – but then Russell came and repeated his poles from the previous year.
Andrea Kimi Antonelli (Mercedes) also rely on medium in the finish and drove to 4th place, even ahead of Lewis Hamilton (Ferrari) and Fernando Alonso (Aston Martin), who also attacked the yellow mature. The big loser was Lando Norris (McLaren), who had to satisfy himself with position 7 with 0.726 seconds.
After the first Q3 attempt, Norris had no lap time on the habit. When braking the target chicane, he drove straight and shortened the curve so that he had to judge it in the second attempt. “Lando, let’s reset and think of your reference points when braking,” warned his racing engineer Will Joseph.
In addition to Norris, Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) is in the fourth series. Leclerc had set up absolute best time in the first sector when he slipped in the middle sector and had to stop the round. “What the hell! This guy,” he swore towards Isack Hadjar (9./Racing Bulls), whose “Dirty Air” Leclerc was the cause of the slide.
However, the TV pictures show that Hadjar Leclerc did not stand in the way and therefore probably has no punishment. So he will go into the race from 9th place, in a row with Alexander Albon (10th), whose Williams team probably had more calculated after the strong start on Friday than a car in the top 10.
Spectacular: Albon flies the bonnet in Q1
Q1 was interrupted at 5:30 minutes, and it didn’t look good for the Williams team at the time. After the hairpin, Alexander Albon was simply flown away by the entire left side of the engine cover, and because he did not immediately notice it, he did not drive directly to the box, but had to do another round.
The race management activated the red flag around the parts lying around. At that time, Alonso was in the lead in Q1, but the two Williams drivers were only 16 and 18 and therefore not qualified for the next round. And while Albon was still able to improve in 8th place, Carlos Sainz retired as the 17th – also because he was stopped on his fast round by Isack Hadjar (Racing Bulls).
Q1 was one of the very scarce sessions in the recent Formula 1 past. Even Pierre Gasly (Alpine) in 20th and last place was only 0.841 seconds behind the best time of Norris (1: 11,826 minutes). And even Sainz on P17 only separated 0.360 seconds from the Leclerc ferrari to P4.
Gabriel Bortoleto (clean, a full 0.007 seconds behind Esteban Ocon in Haas), Sainz, Lance Stroll (Aston Martin), Liam Lawson (Racing Bulls) and Gasly. And that was also very scarce: Lawson on P19 was only 0.147 seconds on Ocons P15 time.
Punishment against Tsunoda: What did he do wrong?
In Q2 there were still just under intervals, but it was no longer as close as in Q1. In the end, Yuki Tsunoda (Red Bull) was the first to miss the cut behind Hadjar 0.099 seconds. In the race on Sunday, however, he will not drive off the eleventh place.
Because: Tsunoda had overtaken Piatri in the third free training under the red flag when he was just rolling back to the box with a plate. The racing commissioners did not allow this to be an excuse and took the Japanese by ten starting positions with a restoration. This means that he will not tackle the Grand Prix of Canada as an eleventh, but as the last.
Together with Tsunoda, Franco Colapinto (Alpine), Nico Hülkenberg (Sauber), Oliver Bearan and Esteban Ocon (both Haas) also left in Q2. The fastest of the second session was Russell with a best time of 1: 11,570 minutes. And with Norris, Leclerc and Verstappen there were four drivers within 0.068 seconds