Montreal is one of my favorite venues on the F1 calendar. We have seen many classics at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve throughout the years. In 1999 Hill, Schumacher, and Villeneuve all went into the wall of the last chicane, thus earning the name the Wall of Champions. In 2008 Robert Kubica took Sauber’s only victory after a spectacular crash retired him from the previous Canadian GP. And in 2011 after over four hours and many trips through the pits, Jenson Button emerged on top. Those races are races that will be remembered for a long time because of the good racing and nail-biting action they produced. 2019 however, will be remembered for a race that was stolen from Vettel by the stewards.
Canada provides an interesting track for the racers. Montreal is a street circuit which is pretty much made up of straights with chicanes thrown in the way. Before the weekend even started it looked like it would be a strong weekend for Ferrari who have the superior engine. Mercedes, however, came prepared with engine upgrades for themselves and for the Racing Points and Williams cars. There was trouble for hometown boy Lance Stroll when his new engine blew out in a practice session, causing a frenzy at the other teams with Mercedes engines, worrying if the same would happen to theirs. With that Stroll was set for qualifying with his old engine as Ferrari aimed to stop a sixth Mercedes poll of the season.
As the temperatures climbed in Montreal the drivers got ready to go to the track for qualifying. Unfortunately for Stroll he again failed to make it out of Qualifying 1 (Q1) this season. His teammate Sergio Perez also failed to make it out of Q1. In Q2 the drivers at the top teams tried to get through Q2 on the medium tyres so they could go for a longer first stint then switch to the hards in the race. Drivers must start on whichever tyres they get through Q2 with. This worked for both Mercedes and Ferrari drivers, but not for Verstappen and Gasly at Red Bull. With Magnussen’s crash pulling out a red flag to end Q2, Max Verstappen was left without a qualifying lap on the softs and thus failed to make it to Q3. This call ended up hurting Red Bull, but it was the right call. Red Bull were going to struggle against the power of Ferrari and Mercedes in the race so they had to start on the mediums. By doing that they could hope for a safety car or probably an undercut attempt to come out ahead of Bottas or Leclerc. In Q3 with Max out, and Bottas and Gasly struggling, Ricciardo capitalized with Renault’s first 2nd row start since Japan 2010. Looking to the top of the grid it was Sebastian Vettel who took his first pole since Germany 2018 (16 races!). Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc slotted in right behind him. Ferrari looked primed for a good race with potentially both drivers finishing on the podium.
The race itself started well with the top five getting away cleanly. Bottas was unlucky and lost a place to the sneaky Hulkenberg who got by after the first two corners. In the Midfield Sainz came pitted early to get off the softs and switch to the hards. The idea from McLaren here was so Sainz could come out of the pits into clean air and makeup time. This worked for most of the race as Sainz, who was up to ninth. However, to Sainz’s avail, the stop came too early. Near the end of the race Stroll and Kvyat got by Sainz, knocking him out of the points. The other Renault powered cars, Renault, couldn’t hold back the charging Bottas and Verstappen as they got pst both drivers. The good news for Renault was that they got both of their cars in the points, and they beat out Pierre Gasly who split them on the starting grid. The talking point of the race, however, was the incident between Hamilton and Vettel on lap 48.
At the time of the incident, both Hamilton and Vettel were on the hard tyres fighting for first. At turn 3 Vettel ran wide into the grass while struggling for grip. As he kept the throttle down out of the grass Vettel needed the entire width of the track to rejoin the circuit. Hamilton went to the outside for the pass when he was that Vettel cut inside on the grass. To me, it looked like Vettel tried to rejoin the track as quickly as he could. In doing so he ignored the possibility of Hamilton trying a pass on the outside. While watching this replay it is clear that Vettel’s rear tyres didn’t have any grip coming off the grass and he could be seen turning out into the path of Hamilton. That was to get the rears on the track so they could get some grip. This move was probably the best possible move that Vettel could’ve made to maintain his position, but in joining the track he did not leave Hamilton enough room. Hamilton was nearly forced into the wall by Vettel and had to stop to avoid colliding with him. While many racers and pundits believed that it was merely a racing incident this is where I disagree. Both drivers were pushing hard and one made a mistake, and the driver who made a mistake (Vettel) rejoined the track in an unsafe manner which nearly took out his rival, Hamilton. Lewis had every right to try to overtake Vettel on the track when Vettel ran off. I believe that Vettel, in this case, should not have rejoined the track so quickly without completely leaving a surging Hamilton room. A time penalty for Vettel did make sense because he rejoined the track unsafely and it caused Hamilton to take a defensive measure to not hit Vettel, which ultimately cost Hamilton a chance to get past him on the track. I understand why fans and pundits are upset over the penalty but it is ultimately Vettel’s responsibility to first not run off the track, and then second to allow his rival room as he makes his way back onto the circuit. I am one of those people who are upset that there was a penalty given out to Vettel. I completely believe that penalties like this are killing racing. Despite that, I understand the stewards decision. I just hope that this incident will change the stewards decisions in the future.
Well, thank you for reading all the way to the end. Please if you enjoyed that follow me @ArtOfKimi on Twitter. Now here are your full results:
- Hamilton (Mercedes)
- Vettel (Ferrari)
- Leclerc (Ferrari)
- Bottas (Mercedes)
- Verstappen (Red Bull)
- Ricciardo (Renault)
- Hulkenberg (Renault)
- Gasly (Red Bull)
- Stroll (Racing Point)
- Kvyat (Toro Rosso)
- Sainz (McLaren)
- Perez (Racing Point)
- Giovinazzi (Alfa Romeo)
- Grosjean (Haas)
- Raikkonen (Alfa Romeo)
- Russell (Williams)
- Magnussen (Haas)
- Kubica (Williams)
DNF. Albon (Toro Rosso)
DNF. Norris (McLaren)
Art Of Kimi 