Reds eliminated in Q2
A session ended with the first two with the same time to the thousandth, with the poleman who achieved the best time on used tyre and with 3 machines in 20 thousandths. This is just a brief summary of how decidedly anomalous the Montreal qualifying was, but, somehow, the quality and problems of the single-seaters emerged anyway, almost glaringly.
Mercedes: Russell hits the window, Hamilton doesn’t, but slowly with the rebirth
We had seen one in the third free practice W15 with so much potential and we wondered whether the changing track conditions would take the Brackley team’s single-seater out of the ideal operating window (always narrow and sensitive on the Mercedes) or whether Hamilton and Russell would be able to remain competitive. The reality is that just George Russell seemed to pull it all together, finding a significantly better level of grip than Hamilton, who in fact declared in post-qualifying interviews that the car behaved differently from free practice. This is nothing new at Mercedes, with the single-seater being very sensitive to changes in external conditions and therefore tending, even without changes to the set-up, to work perfectly in one session and poorly in the next. However, Russell found the right way to keep the car in the optimal rangeprobably also helped by the track returning to “green” with the rain before qualifying, which somewhat reconstructed the conditions of the third free practice.
In the end, in the strange Q3 that took place, Russell set the pole time on a set of used tyres, 3 tenths slower than in Q2 and with crucial help from Alex Albon. The Williams driver was in fact returning to the pits, but maintaining a high speed of over 300 km/h on the home straight. Russell found it in front of him in a perfect position at the exit of the hairpin and followed in its wake until the last chicane, which led him to have a top speed of 334 km/h and gain around 1 tenth over Verstappen. However, the young Englishman spoke of a car that has changed a lot with the latest updates, but to verify that this is true we have to wait for the race: the pace simulations shown by Mercedes have never seemed exceptional, and the exceptional nature of Q3, in which the conditions and above all the response of the cars to environmental inputs was so variable and varied, would require a certain caution, even seeing that Lewis Hamilton found himself at the end, with the same problems he had up until now. However, let’s look at the comparison data between the top 3 to get a clearer idea of the performances of the others.
RedBull in defense, but excellently managed by Max
From the graph we see how Verstappen was actually ahead until Turn 7, thanks to an amazing first sector. A bad outing in S 6-7 and a notable traction from Russell in that stretch bring the Englishman back on par with the Dutchman. The two appear practically tied in time at the exit of the hairpin, with Russell, however, gaining a tenth in the wake of Albon. Verstappen finds an excellent last chicane but it’s not enough. In general what we have noticed is that even in Canada the RB20 has some difficulties with passing curbs and in some more undulating sections of the track, but that the countermeasures implemented by Verstappen himself are bearing fruit. In fact, the Dutchman seems to have found a good compromise between set-up, choice of trajectories and driving style to extract all the possible performance from the single-seaterminimizing the effects of the marked stiffness of the suspension package, and all this narrowly failed to bring him back to pole position (while Perez actually finished P16 in the other Red Bull).
McLaren still the most complete
Once again the Woking car proves to be the most complete, with a good performance Norris (just 21 thousandths from pole) and of Plates immediately behind his teammate. The cars of the team led by Andrea Stella are the only ones to have both finished qualifying in the top 5, partly taking advantage of the lower temperatures, generally congenial to them, and a more high-load aerodynamic setting, as revealed by the indices which we have calculated and a lower than average top speed. Even in the pace simulations the McLaren seemed fast, and this, combined with the fact of being able to count on two cars strategically close together, makes the McLaren duo a special observation for the race.
Ferrari disaster: dull tires and Leclerc’s strange anger
Finally coming to the bad performance of the Maranello team, out in Q2 with both drivers, beyond the single lap, the impression, as also pointed out directly by Leclerc in no uncertain terms, is that the SF24 has never had any peak moments on the flying lapbut lived the entire qualification in “survival” positions, until a few minimal errors were enough to get to the elimination. The obvious lack of grip makes us point the finger at the tyresgiven that when these do not “turn on” the car becomes weak in all phases of the lap, from traction, to braking, to cornering speed.
We have observed the data and the loss of time of Leclerc and Sainz compared to Russell (best time in Q2) has a constant growth trend throughout the entire lap, a sign of a car that has clearly lower tire performance. There is perhaps not too much to be surprised about, given that in Canada we saw the onset of two factors at the same time: on the one hand the temperatures were quite low, with the weekend experiencing bad weather, on the other the morphology of the track means that the single-seaters undergo most of the accelerations on the longitudinal axis, during traction and braking, compared to the lateral one, given that the curves are generally at low speed. This in itself transmits little energy to the tires, since the lateral deformation of the carcass during cornering occurs for a low fraction of the time along the lap. Putting it all together with an SF24 which we know is struggling to get the tires on already due to the nature of the project, we obtain the disappointing performance seen on the track, with a difficulty on the flying lap which emerged already during the third free practice but which the Maranello team evidently did not manage to straighten. Ferrari’s difficulty appeared entirely on the flying lap, given that the results on the long runs didn’t seem as bad, on the contrary, but it’s clear that such a result in qualifying risks compromising the entire Canadian weekend for the reds. For those wondering why updates do not bear fruit, the reality is that the package brought to Imola it did not have as its focal point the improvement of qualifying performance, so in conditions like those encountered in Montreal the old critical issue regarding tire ignition re-emerged in its entirety. Tire inflation pressures may also have played an important role, given that they are directly linked to temperatures and performance, so much so that Vasseur he mentioned them a couple of times in interviews after qualifying. Finally, we noticed a really furious Leclerc after the session and this left us a little surprised, given that there were no glaring strategic errors by the team, as Leclerc himself later said. Normally, when the car lacks performance, the drivers (and especially Leclerc) tend to be disappointed but not necessarily angry at the team, so the impression is that there is something that has made the Monegasque particularly angry, perhaps (but this it’s just a hypothesis) the Ferrari driver had asked for set-up changes after the third free practice sessions to improve performance on the flying lap which were not granted to him.
Race still to be discovered
The many factors we have listed so far lead to a Grand Prix that once again promises to be very interesting. Up front, Russell will fight like a lion to keep first place, with Verstappen and the two McLarens likely to have their chances for victory. Behind the Ferraris are called upon to make a possible comeback, with the unknown rain which could make the race “crazy” and the Safety Cars which are a habit on the Montreal track and which could mix up the cards even more.
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