The Friday in F1 Canadian GP was hectic considering the lack of grip for all leading to incidents and slips, as McLaren were dethroned from the top spot.
It was not easy for drivers on Friday in F1 Canadian GP at Montreal due to low grip conditions. There were several who had moments at various parts of the circuit, some even perished like Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc in FP1 and Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll in FP2.
The hit for Leclerc was not as huge but the consequence was big since it damaged the chassis and as per regulation, he couldn’t run two chassis in a day, which means not only he missed most of FP1 but also all of FP2. The Monegasque was not happy, but didn’t think his confidence was hurt.
It was all on the shoulders of Lewis Hamilton, who had a decent outing but acknowledged the close qualifying fight, which means getting into Q3 will be tough. In a slight surprise, the McLaren F1 pair had rare struggle on opening day. Lando Norris termed it as the worst he has had this year.
Both he and Oscar Piastri didn’t think they did not have the pace, it was more about getting everything together where they lacked. Both feel confident that they can get things together on Saturday. It was same for Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, who remarked that his Friday was decent enough.
Despite some moments, Verstappen felt there was pace in the car to challenge for the top positions. Teammate Yuki Tsunoda felt victim to the close lap times to be down the order. The Japanese driver is eyeing a Q3 finish and expects few changes to the car which will help to achieve it.
Mercedes, meanwhile, have positioned themselves well after bad triple-header. George Russell was fastest in FP2 on the medium compound and had decent pace all-round. Teammate Andrea Kimi Antonelli found good rhythm too, especially coming off from two retirements.
Russell: “It might be my first time top of the leaderboard the whole year! 10 races in… no, obviously we’ve had a very positive day. We had higher expectations coming into this weekend because of the cooler conditions. The track’s quite smooth so the tyres naturally run quite cold and we know our weakness, which is when it’s hot, we struggle and when it’s cold, the tyres run cold, we’re pretty competitive. That was definitely validation today. Nevertheless, we’ll try to maximise this weekend. I think my lap was really strong today, probably optimised. There was nothing more in the tank there. We had it all on the table – full beans, power and all the rest so let’s see what tomorrow brings. You’ve got to be a little bit realistic. We’ll see tomorrow, it’ll be interesting. Clearly, a number of teams are thinking about this medium tyre as well so come Qualifying, do you go on the soft? Do you go on the medium? That’s one of the challenges so far when we’ve had this C6 compound.”
Norris: “[They feel] pretty similar, honestly, but I think it’s more it’s hard to say just from one track. I think you have to go to many more, especially here it’s quite unique with the amount of bumps and kerbs and low grip that we have. So a bit too early to tell, but all of the things are aiming to move the car in the right direction and give me more feeling, which is a good thing. But I would say a tricky day, probably one of the trickiest we’ve had this year. A little bit off the pace comparing to some of the others, and maybe it didn’t look it at the end but [it was] just difficult to ever put a lap together and be consistent – I did one good lap the whole session. We have some work to do. I think we need to get the car in a better place. It’s been our most difficult and everyone’s in the same boat on the track.
“The track’s difficult but it’s definitely been our worst Friday of the year, I would say so far – not worst in the pace, but most difficult to put together and most tricky. We’re not miles away, just need to make it a little bit easier to drive. I think we’re still in a good position, it’s just that it’s close – there’s all the teams up there. Mercedes now seem very, very quick, just as they were last year here – they were quite easily the best last year. We expected them to be fast, they proved that today. But I’m complaining that I’m not first really! We’re still there or thereabouts, it’s just trying to simplify things a little bit, trying to make the car a bit easier to drive. We’ll be there or thereabouts, at the minute I wouldn’t say we’re the quickest but you never know.”
Verstappen: “The day was alright to be honest. I felt quite happy with the car. FP2 was a bit more difficult for other reasons – I think we lost something with the car balance-wise that we need to investigate, but overall I think it was quite a positive day for us. If we can get it back to how it felt in FP1, I think we look quite okay. Let’s see tomorrow – there’s still one more session where people can get it right. For us, we just want to get it in a good window and then we’ll see how far we are up there in Qualifying.”
Leclerc: “First of all, I feel sorry for the whole team, because obviously that’s never something you want. It was a very stupid crash – I had a lock-up, I thought I would make the corner… I knew I would go in the grass, but I thought that was enough to not touch the wall. Unfortunately, when I then ended up in the grass, I understood that there was no room anymore. It’s just a misjudgment, but a misjudgment that cost a lot. The way the wheel has touched the chassis basically cracked the chassis, and we cannot use two chassis on the same day, so that meant basically the whole day not in the car.
“That hurts because that obviously cost us quite a few laps today, but the very positive thing is that I felt very confident with the car. I think we were very competitive at that time, for whatever it’s worth, because it was only the third [push] lap of the day. It doesn’t hurt my confidence, and I’m sure that it won’t hurt my weekend at all. I’m sure I’ll be up to speed in Qualifying. How competitive we will be is another matter, and then we’ll have to see. But I’m sure that personally I’ll be 100%.”
The Williams F1 pair was back in play after solid Friday show in the Top 10. While they acknowledge that FP1 was a bit of playing around with fuel and engine mode, they backed up their good performance in FP2 to put themselves firmly in the Top 10 fight, maybe even against Ferrari and one Red Bull.
The challenge for them would be the likes of Visa Cash App RB and Aston Martin. The former saw both Isack Hadjar and Liam Lawson show good pace to be in the Top 10. As for the latter, Fernando Alonso made his presence felt, even though teammate Stroll suffered early crash in FP2.
The likes of Sauber, Haas and Alpine found themselves closely matched. Both Nico Hulkenberg and Gabriel Bortoleto hovered around the Top 10, while Oliver Bearman made it in as well but not Esteban Ocon. It wasn’t a good day for Franco Colapinto, though, while Pierre Gasly was among Top 10 fighters.
Albon: “Yeah, very positive. We hit the ground running, I think we were maybe running a different programme to everyone else in FP1 at least, so maybe flattered ourselves with it. But FP2, [we were] feeling okay. I think we struggled a little bit with the brakes throughout today, so we lost a little bit of confidence and rhythm which around here is very important. But the base car is strong, I think we have a good package underneath us. I think Q3 is within our targets for tomorrow. It’s one of those ones where the car still doesn’t feel fantastic – we still have some work to do. It’s good, it shows there is a bigger envelope we need to explore. It’s good because we are quick, you don’t want to change too much – there is a bit of balance between it. I don’t think we are quite there yet, and if we want to score big points we are going to have to make the car quicker.”
Hadjar: “It’s my first time driving here in Montréal and it’s nice to see that we’ve been competitive straight away since this morning. It was just a messy session this afternoon in FP2 due to the traffic but we’re confident going to tomorrow. I believe Q1 will be tough traffic-wise, but then Q2 and Q3 will be easier, and getting through these sessions is obviously our realistic target. It’s a small and fast circuit, so I’m sure the gap between each car will be really close, so it will be important to put it all together in Qualifying without making mistakes.”
Hulkenberg: “Overall, a solid Friday for us. The circuit is as tight and technical as ever, and with such a short lap, you really have to stay on top of things. Compared to Barcelona, it’s a completely different challenge—much lower downforce and a focus on low-speed corners, which definitely changes the approach. We worked through the usual Friday program and made several setup changes between FP1 and FP2, which gave us some valuable insights. The tyres were a bit of a surprise—the softs held up better than expected, which could have an impact this weekend. We’ll go through all the data tonight and see where we can make some gains ahead of tomorrow.”
Bearman: “It’s been a tough day, but this afternoon was definitely better than this morning. We made some changes for the afternoon and that’s moved us in the right direction and closed the gap in the midfield, but we still have a bit of work to do tonight before tomorrow. The curb riding has been difficult, but we were expecting that going into this weekend as it’s a bit of a trait on our car. We’re a bit down on performance, so let’s see what we can do overnight – we often perform better on Saturday than we do on Friday.”
Stroll: “Feels good to be back in Canada and I’m happy to be back in the car. We’ve made some setup changes to the car ahead of Canada but unfortunately I had a bit of understeering in FP2 and touched the wall, therefore we didn’t get to learn about the changes we made as much. So it’s tough to say how the car feels around this track, but we’ll restart and go again tomorrow.”
Colapinto: “Today was not the easiest of Practice days and in general I was struggling a lot in the slow speed corners. The car does not feel as connected as we would like, and I am still struggling with the balance. When I try to go to the limit the car is not staying there or giving me the confidence. But this is what Friday is for and to learn what changes to make in order to improve the feeling with the car. The long run on high fuel felt much more positive and the car felt much better. So, we need to understand why that is and translate that also to low fuel. I think there is enough potential to do a good job tomorrow and put everything together. We turned around the weekend in Spain from one day to the next with the changes we made so there is certainly margin to improve.”
Here’s Charles Leclerc crash: https://www.formula1.com/en/video/2025-canadian-gp-fp1-leclerc-crashes-out-to-trigger-red-flags.1834838201992210602
Here’s Lance Stroll crash: https://www.formula1.com/en/video/2025-canadian-gp-fp2-stroll-out-after-hitting-the-barrier-on-his-first-flying-lap.1834851555912650595
Here’s how FP1 in F1 Canadian GP panned out
Here’s how FP2 in F1 Canadian GP panned out
