It’s Verstappen (Red Bull), Sainz Jr. (Ferrari), and Hamilton (Mercedes) in Montreal.
MONTREAL, Canada—Max Verstappen held off a tough challenge by Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz jr. to win the Canadian Grand Prix at the Gilles Villeneuve Circuit Sunday by nine-tenths of a second. Lewis Hamilton, who had been struggling with his Mercedes most of the season, impressed with his second podium of the year, taking third.
Verstappen had no problem at the start, expecting a challenge by Alpine’s Fernando Alonso that never materialized. Alonso, who qualified second, quickly dropped to fourth after both Sainz Jr. and Hamilton passed him.
Two virtual safety cars followed. The first came on lap eight when Verstappen’s Red Bull teammate, Sergio Perez, suffered a gearbox issue. The same thing happened to Mick Schumacher only a few laps later, parking his Haas almost precisely where Perez did his laps earlier. But the virtual safety car did not do much to change the order as only Sainz jr. could follow Verstappen, with the gap between the two just over seven seconds by lap 36.
By lap 69, things got better for Sainz Jr. and the rest of the field. Alpha Tauri’s Yuki Tsunoda came out of the pits with cold tires and went too fast at turn one. The result was that the car failed to turn quickly, and the Japanese slammed into the barriers, producing a real safety car that bunched the field.
Fifteen laps remained when the safety car finally pulled back into the pits, but Verstappen was right there. He regained the lead with Sainz jr. near him. But, Sainz jr. could not get close to the Dutchman, and Verstappen took the checkered flag.
Max Verstappen: It was really exciting at the end. I was giving it everything, but so was Carlos (Sainz). He was pushing, charging, pushing, charging. Naturally, it’s easier to charge when you’re on the DRS. The last few laps were a lot of fun. I would have preferred attacking instead of defending, but luckily it worked out.”
The victory now puts Verstappen at 46 points ahead of Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc, who had to start from 19th position due to a power unit change. But Leclerc raced well, moving up the grid to finish in fifth, one place lower than Mercedes’s George Russell, who once again finished in the top five. Sixth was the second Alpine of Esteban Ocon, while both Alfa Romeos of Valtteri Bottas and Zhou Guanyu were seventh and eighth, respectively.
Alonso managed to finish ahead of Bottas to take seventh but was given a penalty at the end of the race for weaving too much, trying to defend Bottas at the finish. Alonso ended up ninth, while Lance Stroll, in his Aston Martin, took tenth ahead of his home crowd.
The next round will be back in Europe on July 3rd at the famous British Grand Prix at Silverstone.
