Max Verstappen claimed Red Bull Racing’s 100th victory in emphatic style at the Canadian Grand Prix to extend his championship advantage to 69 points.
Verstappen led every lap from pole position, though the advantage of his Red Bull Racing car was much reduced at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve. His lead hovered around five seconds for most of the two-stop battle for the podium and never stretched beyond 10 seconds, the Dutchman putting the reduced pace down to difficulty keeping the tires in the temperature window on the cold and green track. But it was never close enough for pursuers Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton to have a genuine shot at the lead on pace or strategy and ultimately amounted to another straightforward win.
“Very happy right now,” he said. “To win again today, to win the 100th grand prix for the team — that’s incredible.”
The triumph in Montreal brings his career tally to 41, the same number as Ayrton Senna, putting him equal fifth on the F1 honor role for total victories.
“It’s amazing. I never expected to be on these kinds of numbers myself as well,” he admitted. “We keep enjoying, we keep working hard. Today is a great day again.”
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The battle for the podium went down to the wire between Alonso and Hamilton, who spent the race engaged in a fascinating duel.
Hamilton jumped Alonso with a better start on the first lap and held the place through the first stops, but the Aston Martin was happier on the hard tire in the middle stint. It allowed Alonso to launch a move on the Briton at the final chicane on lap 22 to take back second place and build an almost five-second buffer.
Hamilton reacted by opening the second stop window on lap 40, forcing Alonso to respond on the following tour. The Mercedes took mediums but Aston Martin continued with hards.
For the first 15 laps of the stint Hamilton ate into the deficit until he was less than two seconds adrift, but Alonso was conserving fuel and brakes. He was allowed to push again to prevent Hamilton from getting within a second, breaking the challenge and leading the Briton home by 4.5s.
“We were pushing all the race,” he said. “I didn’t have one lap where we could relax a little bit. It was an amazing battle.
“At the end I think Lewis had a bit more pace. It was tough, a very demanding race.”
Hamilton was pleased to have taken another confident podium finish with his upgraded Mercedes.
“It’s honestly been a great weekend for us,” he said. “We’re slowly chipping away. To just have this consistency and up on the podium here in Montreal … quite an honor to be up there with two world champions.”
Ferrari turned around its disappointing Saturday performance with a rare perfect strategy, with Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz rising from 10th and 11th to fourth and fifth. Both started on medium tires and neither stopped during the early safety car, called for on-track debris.
Sainz was ordered not to fight Leclerc to maximize stint length to laps 38 and 39 respectively, by which time they were so far ahead of the midfield that they rejoined the race without losing places.
They were again ordered not to fight, ensuring the chasing Sergio Perez, recovering from 12th after his own poor qualifying performance, didn’t have an opening to close them down. Instead the Mexican made an additional late stop for soft tires to take a consolation point for fastest lap.
Alex Albon drove a spectacular defensive race with a single pit stop to finish seventh, creating an enormous slipstream train behind him in the second half of the race.
The smile says it all! What a performance 😁#CanadianGP #F1 @alex_albon @WilliamsRacing pic.twitter.com/oHRXmvS8uH
— Formula 1 (@F1) June 18, 2023
Esteban Ocon couldn’t find a way past, finishing eighth ahead of Lando Norris. The McLaren driver, however, was demoted to 13th with a five-second penalty for driving unnecessarily slowly behind the safety car — he had been accused of building a gap to prevent himself from losing time in a double-stack pit stop.
The penalty promoted Lance Stroll to ninth, up from 16th, and Valtteri Bottas to 10th, up from 14th after a single stop.
Oscar Piastri finished 0.669s out of the points in 11th ahead of Pierre Gasly, Norris and Yuki Tsunoda.
Nico Hulkenberg hoped for points from fifth on the grid but had made his first stop just before the safety car, dropping him deep into the pack and leaving him 15th ahead of Zhou Guanyu.
Kevin Magnussen and Nyck de Vries finished last of the finishers after tangling on lap 35. De Vries attempted to dive down the Dane’s inside at Turn 3 but locked up and took to the run-off zone. Magnussen, on his outside, had no choice but to follow him.
George Russell retired late with residual damage from a crash at Turn 9 on lap 12, while Logan Sargeant was told to stop on track with a technical problem.
