Luke’s Weekend Review – Canadian GP 2023

Leave a Comment / News / By

Action-Packed Race at Round 9: Penalties, Overtakes, and Drama Unfold at the Canadian GP

Canada 5

And that is Round 9 done and dusted and it was a fairly interesting race, wasn’t it? What did you thin about it, we had a bit of everything from Virtual Safety Cars, Safety Cars, penalties, overtakes and a few on track battles. Overall, I think this was a good race to watch and enjoy.

After qualifying we had a few penalties applied to drivers for impeding and going too fast under the Red Flag. We see Yuki Tsunoda, Lance Stroll and Carlos Sainz all receive a 3-place grid penalty for impeding another driver during qualifying and then the biggest upset as Nico Hulkenberg also gets a 3-place grid penalty for going too fast in Qualifying when the Red Flag came out in Q3. Hulkenberg had just finished his lap that got him on the front row and had just started going for another fast lap but by the time the Red Flag came out, Hulkenberg was already 1.5 seconds above the delta in Sector 1. He later admitted that the beep in his helmet confused him as he thought he was driving too slowly. This penalty meant that instead of a front row start in 2nd place, Hulkenberg was dropped down to 5th which was still his best starting position in his F1 career.

At the start of the race, we see that the medium tyre compound was the preferred tyre as 16 out of the 20 drivers opted to start on the yellow striped tyre. After the drivers made their way to the grid we see that there was work going on, on Charles Leclerc’s car where changes were going on the floor of the car, a wall of mechanics were protecting the car from any cameramen to ensure that the floor is not shown to the wider audience and any rival teams. Ferrari had both their drivers starting out of position in 10th and 11th due to the bad timing in their qualifying strategy.

We now head onto the start of the race as we see Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton get a great start as both drivers get away well, even though Fernando Alonso had great reactions off the line his car somehow struggled off the line which made him lose a position to Hamilton by turn 1 and having to defend heavily against George Russell on the following corners. Alonso was able to hold onto 3rd place and later on managed to get 2nd place back from Hamilton after a few laps. The start of the race was clean and there was no contact between drivers however at the end of lap 1 Kevin Magnussen had to take evasive actions not to hit the back of Sergio Perez as he very quickly closed a gap on Magnussen before the last chicane. Perez was just coming off a battle with Carlos Sainz and had to quickly get behind the slipstream of Sainz which led to Magnussen having to go onto the grass and cutting the last chicane to remain in the race.

On lap 7 we unfortunately had the 1st retirement of the race where we hear Logan Sargeant’s Engineer come on the radio to tell Sargeant to bring his car to a stop somewhere safe on the track very urgently. This incident has unfortunately brought Logan Sargeant’s no DNF streak to an end. We also see the VSC come out for a brief period of time until the marshals clear out the Williams off the track. The VSC neutralised the race for a moment but given that it was a very short VSC as Sargeant managed to park his car right by the marshals and made their life easier to remove his car from harm’s way.

George Russell's Crash, Pitstop Drama, and Alex Albon's Stunning Drive: Highlights of the Action-Packed Canadian GP in Montreal

At around lap 12 is when the race got slightly interesting, first we hear Max Verstappen come on the radio saying that he thinks that he hit a bird on track which he later confirmed that it was still on the car at the end of the race and that he feels sorry for the mechanic who will have to remove it. More interestingly we see the Safety coming out as George Russell hits the wall coming out of turn 8 while he was pushing hard to try and catch up to Fernando Alonso. This crash gave Russell a rear puncture and some front wing damage although he managed to make it back to the pits to get the car back out on track and racing. After the Safety Car, Russell was unable to get back into the groove and we didn’t see him do much progress from the back of the grid up until lap 55 where Mercedes told him to pit and retire the car due to cooling issues on the brakes which potentially emerged from the crash earlier in the race.

During the Safety Car we saw most drivers pit for a cheap pitstop, but we see both the Ferraris, Sergio Perez, Magnussen and Valtteri Bottas stay out for position. This really paid off for the Ferraris and Perez as they managed to make up some decent places as Leclerc, Sainz and Perez managed to finish 4th, 5th and 6th respectively when they started in 10th, 11th and 12th. During the pitstop mayhem we saw 2 potential unsafe releases from Mercedes as they released Hamilton in front of Alonso and Mclaren as they released Lando Norris in front of Alex Albon, but after the FIA investigated both incidents, they decided that no further action was required. This was not the only incident during the Safety Car that the FIA had under investigation as they also had Esteban Ocon, Bottas and Magnussen under investigation for possible overtaking under the Safety Car. This also required no further action as the teams had taken it upon themselves to sort out the right places on track.

The restart, like the initial start was very clean and there were no dramas at all and Max managed to get a good run on the pit straight to get away from Hamilton into a safe distance away from the rest of the pack where he could have a chilled race like we have been seeing this season so far. Having said that Alonso and Hamilton were not as far behind Max this time out in Montreal, whether this is due to the upgrades Aston Martin and Mercedes brought to their cars or due to Verstappen taking it very easy is yet to be found in the coming races but I for one am a bit hopeful that we might be getting some competition in the front of the grid as well.

With 1st place nearly guaranteed for Max we switch the focus for the race for 2nd place. After the great getaway from Hamilton at the start of the race and taking 2nd place off Alonso, we see Alonso coming back at Hamilton on lap 21 where he was right on the back of Hamilton’s gearbox and by lap 22 the oldest and most experienced driver on the grid made it past the 7 time world champion before the final chicane.

The second stint of the race was fairly quiet until we hear Max coming on the radio complaining about the amount of grip he was getting from the hards he put on during the Safety Car. Max wasn’t the only one struggling with grip as we see similar times from the drivers behind him. By lap 41 we see the front runners come back into the pits for a new set of shoes to ensure they had enough rubber to make it to the end of the race. Hamilton was the first one tom come in for a new set of mediums and Alonso quickly followed the following lap, however Alonso opted to go for the harder compound and went for the hards. With a free pitstop Max also dipped into the pits for a new set of mediums to ensure he protects himself from any late attacks from the places behind.

The best drive from the whole Canadian GP was in my opinion all about Alex Albon, and the majority of the fans agrees with me as he ended up getting the Driver of the Day award after a brilliant drive from the Thai-British driver. Albon managed to finish the race in 7th place after starting in 9th having a few good battles on track and showing how good the new Williams upgrades are working. On race day their straight-line speed was unrivalled as many drivers attempted and failed to overtake Albon with DRS to no avail.

Top 10 was formed by  Verstappen, Alonso, Hamilton, Leclerc, Sainz, Perez, Albon, Ocon, Norris and Stroll, however Norris had a 5 second penalty that he got due to sportsmanship behaviour during the Safety Car pushing him down to 13th and pushing Bottas into the top 10 to take the last championship point. The podium was formed by 3 world champions which between them have 11 world titles. Something tells me that this is not the last time we will see these 3 on the podium together this season.

Who do you think was the biggest winners and the biggest losers of the Canadian GP? We now head into a week break before we return to the track at the Austrian GP.

Share this article with your friends

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *