Hamilton was joined on the front row at a cloudy and chilly Gilles-Villeneuve Circuit by Rosberg for the first time since their sensational first-lap collision at last month’s Spanish Grand Prix. But the difference between him and the competition wasslim.
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And with Rosberg, who spun on the penultimate lap attempting to pass Max Verstappen, crossing the line only fifth, Hamilton has slashed the gap in the championship from 24 to just nine points.
Q: Back to Lewis, obviously the race tomorrow is one of your favourites, you’ve won it four times, three times from pole position but clear the challenge from Ferrari looks a little stronger this weekend.
“After that it was just trying to chase him down”, said Hamilton, who posted the first of his 45 career Formula One wins in Montreal in 2007. “Of course very, very frustrating but it’s my job to make sure that I’m ahead after a battle like that today and it just didn’t work out today”.
Williams pair Valtteri Bottas and Felipe Massa came home within a second of Hamilton in seventh and eighth, displaying how the field has bunched up ahead of Sunday, when forecast rain could increase the chances of an upset.
Lewis Hamilton is Canadian Grand Prix champion again.
Force India’s Sergio Perez managed to finish on the podium in the Monaco Grand Prix the last time out, but he was disappointingly left out of the third qualifying session when he failed to make the top ten.
Australian Daniel Ricciardo qualified fourth for Red Bull, with 18-year-old team-mate Max Verstappen fifth and Kimi Raikkonen sixth for Ferrari.
“I was really low on fuel, because of battling all the way through and always having to overtake”.
Hamilton and Rosberg, starting 1-2 in the front row, again touched at the start while Vettel squeezed around them both to take the lead.
After losing out to Lewis Hamilton at the Canadian GP, Sebastian Vettel has confessed he was distracted by seagulls! They remain comfortably quicker than Force India, who retains a small margin of advantage on the likes of McLaren, Toro Rosso and Haas F1 by again getting a vehicle into Q3.
“Honestly, qualifying wasn’t great for me”, said Hamilton in what could be viewed as a thinly-veiled dig at team-mate Rosberg. I knew the number was massively red and didn’t know if I was going to get to the end of the race. My position was on the outside, in Barcelona I gave it a go round the outside and it worked out really well.
Jenson Button, the 2011 victor, pulled over and out of the race on the 12th lap with his MacLaren’s engine in flames.
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Jenson Button was next up in 12th in the other McLaren Honda, 0.120secs further back, with Toro Rosso’s Daniil Kvyat 13th from Haas F1 duo Esteban Gutierrez and Romain Grosjean and Carlos Sainz.
