Williams team principal James Vowles said the damage to Alex Albon’s car is “extensive” after the Williams driver hit a marmot and then went into the wall during Canadian Grand Prix practice. Vowles said: "The damage to the car is extensive. Front corner, rear corner, floor, front wing, suspension."





"This feels great after a tough Miami but I never doubted myself. I know what I can do. Miami is unique and this is an amazing circuit with high grip. It feels you are driving a proper F1 car around here, which is how it should be. It came together today. The team have done a great job to bring things forward and there is now a big focus for tomorrow. We are making baby steps. "I am not going to say we are going to fly off the line. I hope that's the case but history tells us that hasn't happened often or at all this year. McLaren have been making good starts."
P1) George Russell P2) Kimi Antonelli: +0.068 P3) Lando Norris: +0.315 P4) Oscar Piastri: +0.334 P5) Lewis Hamilton: +0.361 P6) Charles Leclerc: +0.445 P7) Max Verstappen: +0.539 P8) Isack Hadjar: +0.640 P9) Arvid Lindblad: +0.772 P10) Carlos Sainz: +1.571 Knocked Out (Q2) P11) Nico Hülkenberg P12) Gabriel Bortoleto P13) Franco Colapinto P14) Esteban Ocon P15) Oliver Bearman P16) Fernando Alonso Knocked Out (Q1) P17) Sergio Perez P18) Lance Stroll P19) Pierre Gasly P20) Valtteri Bottas P21) Alexander Albon P22) Liam Lawson


Fernando Alonso said a lock-up left him with nowhere to avoid the wall after crashing out of SQ1 in sprint qualifying for the Canadian Grand Prix at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve. Alonso said: "I locked up the front and there is no room to avoid anything here in Canada. Too much on the limit. We are a little behind with the pace so we were pushing seven or eight places more than we should have."

Racing Bulls has been fined €30,000 for Liam Lawson’s stoppage in practice in Canada, with €20,000 suspended for 12 months, after stewards found the car’s clutch disengagement system did not comply with Article C9.3 of the technical regulations. In their verdict, the stewards said a ruptured joint caused a hydraulic leak that stopped the car, but when the CDS was activated it "failed to release the clutch and hence the car could not be moved", calling that a "serious matter" because "Had the system worked as intended by the regulations, the incident could have been dealt with swiftly via deployment of the Virtual Safety Car."


Red Bull Racing boss Laurent Mekies says Red Bull Ford Powertrains supports the proposed 2027 Formula 1 regulations changes, even though he accepts there is not yet unanimity among stakeholders after the FIA said a 60:40 split between combustion engine and electrical component had been agreed in principle. Mekies said: "We support any step that the sport wants to make to get closer to flat-out qualifying and to flat-out racing. As Red Bull Ford Powertrains, for sure, we support this change. You will find nobody comfortable with changing so late for next year, and that's why we have so many discussions. But certainly, we are happy to step out of that comfort zone for the benefit of the sport."

Red Bull's Laurent Mekies says he is not concerned Max Verstappen will leave the team, adding that the constant questions about the four-time world champion’s future have become an inside joke. Mekies was asked about Verstappen after confirmation that his long-time race engineer Gianpiero Lambiase will leave Red Bull to join McLaren as its chief racing officer no later than 2028. Mekies said: "No, I'm not concerned [that Verstappen will follow GP to McLaren]. We always have this joke. We are not going to ask Max every week if he's going to stay. Max is telling us he's happy at Red Bull. He is involved in every strategic decision we are making, he is at the heart of the project."

Laurent Mekies says he understood GianPiero Lambiase was leaving Red Bull to become McLaren team principal, after speaking to Max Verstappen’s race engineer before he made his decision. Mekies said: "Look, it's certainly my understanding that GP [GianPiero] is going to McLaren to become a team principal. That's what I told you at the time. Obviously, we had a number of conversations before he was going to make the decision. Now, don't ask me if it's going to happen. The timing of it is none of my business. I can just tell you the content of our conversations."
Racing Bulls team principal Alan Permane says the hydraulic damage that stopped Liam Lawson early in practice at the Canadian Grand Prix could be “terminal” and leave the team in a race against time to make Sprint qualifying. Permane said: "Yeah, very frustrating, especially on a Sprint weekend. It's tough to lose the car so early on. It's a hydraulic leak. As I came up here, we didn't have the car back yet, so I don't know how serious it is. It could be something very simple and we could be out comfortably for the next session, or it could be something a bit more terminal, so yeah, watch this space."

Isack Hadjar says he was still “pissed off” with himself after crashing out in Miami, where he started from the back of the grid following a post-qualifying technical check failure and felt he could have finished in the points. Hadjar said: "I was just pissed off at myself, a lack of focus. Everything was going well before that. It was clear that we would end up in the points and I couldn't because I made a mistake, so I was really pissed."

Esteban Ocon has avoided a penalty at the Canadian Grand Prix after leaving the pit lane 1.11 seconds after the end of practice. After reviewing timing, video, telemetry and in-car footage, the stewards ruled it was “almost certain that the driver could not have seen the light change from green to red due to his close proximity to the line at the pit exit”, so although “a breach of regulation was committed”, “no penalty is applied.”


Charles Leclerc says getting the most out of a car’s overall package, rather than simply bolting on upgrades, is likely to be the key to performance this season as Ferrari try to extract more from the update they introduced at the Miami Grand Prix. Leclerc said: "I think a lot about these cars is optimising. I mean, if I look a little bit doing a step back on the performance of each team, I don't fully believe that it's all down to the upgrades that each team have brought, the step that we've seen. So I think it's very difficult to have a good picture of how much the upgrades are doing."

Esteban Ocon is under investigation after a chaotic end to practice for the Canadian Grand Prix, where he spun at the exit of Turn 4 in the final 10 minutes and hit the wall hard enough to scatter front-wing debris across the track. The Haas driver managed to get the car back to the garage, but after the brief red flag to clear the circuit he was then noted for allegedly leaving the pit lane while the red light was illuminated at the end of the session.

Charles Leclerc escaped a sporting penalty after the stewards found him "guilty of speeding in the pit lane" at 16.3km/h over the 80km/h limit during practice for the Canadian Grand Prix. Ferrari was fined €1,000 for the incident.

Liam Lawson is due to see the stewards before sprint qualifying at the Canadian Grand Prix after his car stopped 12 minutes into FP1 and triggered a red flag. FIA technical delegate Jo Bauer referred the case because the clutch disengagement system did not function when marshals tried to recover the car, stating: “When car 30 stopped on the track during FP1, the marshals pressed the CDS button at 12:41” but “the CDS was not working as required by the F1 Regulations, Article C9.3.”


Kimi Antonelli led a Mercedes 1-2 amid three red flags in the sole practice session at the Canadian Grand Prix






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