Vettel breaks Red Bull win duck in Canada - Race Report

The Canadian GP weekend started with rainy and humid conditions. The drivers had all the free practice sessions on a wet or drying track and the qualifying continued the same way as it was rainy. The unpredictable conditions gave some surprises as Williams’ Valtteri Bottas showed great pace in all the qualifying sessions and got himself to the last qualifying session. He continued his great pace and made the biggest surprise of the session as he got himself to the grid and was going to start the race just behind the pole setter Sebastian Vettel and second fastest Lewis Hamilton. Ferrari’s Felipe Massa crashed in the Q2 session and caused a red flag with only 2 minutes left on the clock. This caused traffic on the pit exit as drivers tried to get out soon to make a better lap. Several drivers tried to get a better position on the line coming outside from the actual line and got investigated by the stewards afterwards. Stewards punished Kimi Räikkönen and Daniel Ricciardo with grid penalties of two positions: this meant Räikkönen was going to start 10th and Ricciardo 11th.

The race day itself was sunny with some forecasts predicting rain. It was going to be a step to unknown for the teams as there was no experience from the track on a fully try weather. In the race, Vettel had a good start and pulled away from others, with Hamilton behind him. For Bottas, it was difficult: he soon lost two positions to Nico Rosberg and Mark Webber, who started 5th and 6th. Bottas was soon under pressure from Fernando Alonso’s Ferrari. It was clear that the rainy conditions would have been much better for the Finn. Bottas tried his best but couldn’t keep Alonso behind. Soon Bottas had collected a train behind him. Felipe Massa, meanwhile, did a good job grabbing some positions on the track as he started 16th after his crash on Saturday’s qualifying.Vettel started to pull a gap from the lead while the top 5 was easily pulling away from others. Bottas was still a headache for many drivers and Sutil tried to make a move on him, but spun, causing a dangerous looking situation. But everyone managed to avoid Sutil’s car and he continued on his way after loosing a few positions. Coming to the hairpin, Pastor Maldonado drove into Sutil’s rear, causing some damage to his own front wing and to Sutil’s rear wing. Sutil came to the pits after his dramatic lap and Maldonado was given a drive-through penalty for causing a collision.

A couple of laps later, the top 5 started to make their pit stops, with Webber coming to pits first and taking the prime compound. Gaps between drivers were already big as Webber was 4th, before making his stop and returned to 5th position on the track. Rosberg came in on the next lap for option tyres and was able to get himself back in front of Webber. Bottas came to the pits too and dropped to the 13th position. Vettel and Alonso came in too, in the next couple of laps, but Hamilton was staying out a little bit longer than his rivals. When he finally came in, he managed to stay in front of Rosberg and Webber.

Räikkönen was able to put himself up to 6th once his rivals had made their pit stops, while he was saving his tyres, seemingly trying to make only one stop. He was told on the radio that he should save fuel and also they might have a KERS issue. The day didn’t continue well for Räikkönen when he came for his stop to take the prime compound: the team had issues keeping the car up and had a problem attaching the right rear tyre. It was a slow stop and wasn’t going to help the Finn’s difficult afternoon.

Vettel was leading with Hamilton 2nd, then Rosberg, Webber and Alonso battling for the 3rd position. Laps later, Webber was able to pass Rosberg and the Mercedes driver tried to close the door from Alonso, but couldn’t keep the Spaniard behind. Later on, Webber was going to lap Van Der Garde coming to the hairpin. Blue flags were waved and it seemed Van Der Garde made space for Webber, but in the end he didn’t and the two collided, making Webber damage his front wing and Van Der Garde to spin. The stewards soon gave Van Der Garde a 10 seconds stop-and-go penalty for ignoring blue flags and causing a collision. Thanks to the collision, Alonso was able to catch Webber and soon he got past and moved himself to the 3rd place. Ironically, the damaged front wing didn’t do much harm for Webber’s pace and his front wing wasn’t changed when he came for his second pit stop.

Soon Van Der Garde was in trouble again: his front wing was damaged and went under his car dangerously. The Caterham driver had to stop his car off the track. Replays showed how Nico Hülkenberg collided with Van Der Garde. The touch didn’t look too bad, but it was strong enough to break Hülkenberg’s suspension and he was out from the race. Meanwhile, on the lead, Vettel made a mistake on the first corner and went wide. Maybe he needed some action on the lead as he was cruising on the lead since the start. It didn’t cost much for the triple world champion as the gap behind was bigger than 15 seconds.

Force India’s Paul Di Resta had a surprisingly long run: he started with prime tyres and he continued with the same tyres until lap 57, when he finally came for his stop to take the option compound. The strategy worked surprisingly well.

Alonso started to haunt Hamilton’s second place and laps later, he was able to make the move after the start finish straight, seemingly with a small contact. But the Spaniard pulled away and Hamilton dropped to 3rd. Gutierrez, meanwhile, came to the pits for his last stop and soon after, the replays showed the Mexican off the track after the pit exit. There was never a replay shown about what really happened, but it seemed the Mexican made a mistake coming out from the pits.

Räikkönen was running in 8th place and was going to continue his long streak of point finishes, but he was under pressure from Felipe Massa, who was also having a good race with loads of battles after starting from the middle field, and he was hungry to get past his old team mate. Massa made the move just before the double went to the last lap, dropping the Lotus driver to 9th. The day wasn’t as expected for the Finn, as Lotus had expected even a podium place from him, even if the starting position wasn’t very good.

It was an easy race for Vettel, who took his first Canadian GP victory. Alonso was 2nd and Hamilton 3rd. Webber managed to keep 4th after all the strange action and Rosberg was 5th. Jean-Eric Vergne had a great race with his Toro Rosso and was 6th. Paul di Resta was 7th with his different strategy, Massa 8th, Räikkönen 9th and Sutil 10th on the last point finish. It was a disappointing race in the end for Valtteri Bottas as he was aiming to finish on points, but finished 14th after a great qualifying result.