The F1 Stat Blog Your Home of F1 Statistics
The Canadian GP was just amazing, easily the best race of the season so far. While the battle for the lead was entirely non-existent, battles for almost every other position more than made up for it.
Lewis Hamilton was incredibly dominant all day, he took pole position, he led every single lap of the race and somehow, and I have no idea how, he set the fastest lap of the race on 30 lap old super soft tyres while Sebastian Vettel was on fairly fresh ultra softs. To say he’s good in Canada is a massive understatement, he’s won the race six times now, just one short of Michael Schumacher’s record at the track.
Max Verstappen had an incredible start to the race, starting fifth and running around the outside of turn 1 into second place, causing some damage to Sebastian Vettel in the process. Unfortunately for Max though his car failed on the tenth lap and he couldn’t get anything from that amazing start. After the first safety car period Vettel pitted for a new wing and was dead last, after a long race and a late pit stop for fresh tyres he rocketed through to fourth, just short of a podium.
Valtteri Bottas finished the race in second, very much on his own all race long with nothing of much interest happening, Daniel Ricciardo came in third and was mostly just holding off the Force Indias all race and then later Sebastian Vettel. A bit further down the grid Fernando Alonso was on fire in the late stages of the race, so much so that only Hamilton, Vettel and Raikkonen set a faster race lap than him, with a Honda engine, that’s just amazing! Unfortunately for him though that Honda engine failed with just a few laps left of the race, while he was running in the points as well.
The greatest story of the race for me though, Lance Stroll. He has been consistently and unfairly ridiculed by fans and given and unfair reputation for crashing because of a poor start. I said before the race he could score points, nobody believed me. What does he do? He has the race of his life, he has some great battles with Nico Hulkenberg and Kevin Magnussen, he finishes in the points and he silences those critics. The first Canadian driver since 1996 to score points in Canada, the first non-Villeneuve Canadian to score points.
Both Force Indias as well had a great race, had they played their cards slightly differently or varied strategy a podium was on the cards, but instead they were “only” fifth and sixth.
Once again Mercedes and Ferrari switch place in the Constructors’ (almost getting bored of typing this now!), while Renault move up to sixth after Hulkenberg’s points finish and Toro Rosso have an absolutely horrific race. I mean it was really bad, Kvyat doesn’t get away from the grid, takes too long to get going and then takes his position back when he shouldn’t have. Carlos Sainz crashed out on the first lap. Then Kvyat gets a drive through for that mistake, then a 10 second penalty because he was given the wrong penalty, then his car fails on him and he retires. Both drivers got penalty points in the race.
Esteban Ocon takes back the two positions he lost in Monaco after his great race while Lance Stroll moves up two for his first F1 points finish.
| Pos | Driver | Team | Nation | Points | Laps | Fastest Lap | Grid |
| 1 | Lewis Hamilton | Mercedes | GBR | 25 | 70 | 01:14.551 | 1 |
| 2 | Valtteri Bottas | Mercedes | FIN | 18 | 70 | 01:15.894 | 3 |
| 3 | Daniel Ricciardo | Red Bull | AUS | 15 | 70 | 01:16.165 | 6 |
| 4 | Sebastian Vettel | Ferrari | GER | 12 | 70 | 01:14.719 | 2 |
| 5 | Sergio Perez | Force India | MEX | 10 | 70 | 01:16.367 | 8 |
| 6 | Esteban Ocon | Force India | FRA | 8 | 70 | 01:16.247 | 9 |
| 7 | Kimi Raikkonen | Ferrari | FIN | 6 | 70 | 01:15.388 | 4 |
| 8 | Nico Hulkenberg | Renault | GER | 4 | 70 | 01:16.136 | 10 |
| 9 | Lance Stroll | Williams | CAN | 2 | 69 | 01:15.979 | 17 |
| 10 | Romain Grosjean | Haas | FRA | 1 | 69 | 01:16.949 | 14 |
| 11 | Jolyon Palmer | Renault | GBR | 0 | 69 | 01:16.704 | 15 |
| 12 | Kevin Magnussen | Haas | DEN | 0 | 69 | 01:16.341 | 18 |
| 13 | Marcus Ericsson | Sauber | SWE | 0 | 69 | 01:16.995 | 19 |
| 14 | Stoffel Vandoorne | McLaren | BEL | 0 | 69 | 01:16.774 | 16 |
| 15 | Pascal Wehrlein | Sauber | GER | 0 | 68 | 01:17.091 | PL |
| 16 | Fernando Alonso | McLaren | ESP | 0 | 66 | 01:15.853 | 12 |
| RET | Daniil Kvyat | Toro Rosso | RUS | – | 54 | 01:16.713 | 11 |
| RET | Max Verstappen | Red Bull | NED | – | 10 | 01:17.187 | 5 |
| RET | Felipe Massa | Williams | BRA | – | 0 | – | 7 |
| RET | Carlos Sainz | Toro Rosso | ESP | – | 0 | – | 13 |
