Wet, Wild Qualifying in Canada
The racing line was dry. Then it was wet. Back to Dry. Back to wet. Drivers were subject to ever-changing conditions and qualifying in Canada was uncertain until the very last moment in an action packed session at the Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve.
Red Bull’s Sebastian Vettel beat out Mercedes-Benz driver Lewis Hamilton for pole position in tomorrow’s race. It was the first time in four races that a Mercedes-Benz wasn’t the top qualifying car.
Williams F1 rookie Valtteri Bottas stunned everyone, negotiating the bad conditions arguably better than anyone else and took his typically mid-field Williams chassis and qualified 3rd.
The conditions forced good drivers into mistakes all day long. Braking points were missed, corners and chicanes cut. There were no major accidents until two minutes remaining in the session when Ferrari driver Filipe Massa crashed at turn 3.
The Brazilian was hard on the brakes in his F138 when he used a little too much of the circuit and put his left front and rear tires on the white boundary line. His old, intermediate wet weather tires offered no grip on the slick paint and his car turned 90 degrees. He slid across the grass and into the barriers.
Massa slammed both hands on his steering wheel. It’s his third crash in the last two weeks.
Massa’s shunt red flagged the session with 1.59 seconds remaining. On the restart, Jenson Button tried to make some room between him and the car ahead, Mark Webber. Button put a little too much room between he and Webber and when he crossed the line to start his last flying lap, he was too late and the session had ended. The McLaren driver didn’t have a fast enough time for Q3.
Behind Bottas is Mercedes Driver Nico Rosberg. Webber will start 5th, and Alonso 6th.
70 laps tomorrow in weather very similar to today’s qualifying. Summer in Montreal.
Tune in tomorrow on NBC 2ET and come back to 6speed for a full race recap.