Five winners, five losers: Canadian Grand Prix
- Peter Johnson
- Jun 21
- 7 min read
Written by Peter Johnson, Edited by Charlotte Mui
Formula One’s European season took a brief diversion to North America, but who will enjoy the long flight back and who will just want to go home?
Winner - George Russell
It was a spellbinding lap from George Russell to snatch Pole position by a fairly considerable margin (by 2025 standards) on Saturday, and he held his nerve on Sunday for a thoroughly deserved victory.
Toto Wolff said prior to the race that the warmer temperatures on race day may pose a problem for Mercedes, while McLaren, who tend to thrive in hotter conditions, would likely be a threat. However, Russell experienced no such problems and controlled the race from the front throughout.
Debate will continue as to whether he deserved some sort of sanction for brake-checking Max Verstappen under the safety car, but what is not up for discussion is that the Briton was very much the fastest man on track across Saturday and Sunday.
While the 2025 World Championship may seem out of reach for anybody outside of McLaren, Mercedes are tipped to have a very strong package under the new 2026 regulations. Russell may be hitting the form of his career at just the right time ahead of a serious tilt at the title next time out.
Winner - Andrea Kimi Antonelli
Completing Mercedes’ best team result since the Las Vegas Grand Prix last November was teen sensation Andrea Kimi Antonelli, who became the third-youngest podium finisher in Formula One history at just his tenth attempt.
Antonelli has shown flashes of brilliance since his debut, with a phenomenal wet weather drive from 16th to fourth in Australia and a Miami Sprint Pole his two main highlights. He can file his performance in Montreal right up there alongside those two standout drives.
From fourth on the grid, the young Italian’s first-lap overtake on Oscar Piastri set him up nicely for a rewarding afternoon. He almost snatched second from Max Verstappen on a couple of occasions too, coming closest after his second pit stop when he drew alongside the Dutchman at the pit exit.
Antonelli’s performance in Canada also showed great resolve, following three point-less races in the Imola-Monaco-Spain triple header. While fellow rookie drivers Liam Lawson and Jack Doohan, for example, have perhaps created further struggles for themselves by dwelling on previous sub-par performances, Antonelli’s ability to brush off his past misfortune is testament to his remarkable maturity.
Winner - Oscar Piastri
It is beginning to feel like any weekend in which Oscar Piastri does not drop points to Lando Norris is a victory in itself. By claiming a further 12 points over his teammate in Montreal, despite finishing off the podium, this weekend was a case in point.
McLaren brought a series of upgrades to Canada, the only front-running outfit besides Mercedes to do so. It will surely be of some concern to the team that the papaya cars did not disappear up the road either on Saturday or Sunday, which was the expectation of many.
Nevertheless, Piastri qualified a respectable third, which put some considerable daylight between him and his teammate for the race.
Losing out to Antonelli at the race start was of no great concern given the Mercedes’ clear pace advantage over the weekend, and although Piastri looked like he might be able to reclaim a spot on the podium, he will certainly be happy just to extend his championship lead once again.
Winner - Nico Hülkenberg
Nico Hülkenberg has absolutely come alive over the last couple of races. While there was a lot of chatter over the weekend about what Nico Rosberg eats for breakfast, it is really Hülkenberg’s morning routine we should be aspiring to replicate.
With a second successive points finish, the German has elevated himself to 11th in the World Championship, just one point shy of the top half of the standings. This is a truly remarkable feat given he’s driving for the team that propped up the Constructors’ Championship last season.
Staggeringly, Hülkenberg alone has scored 14 points across the last two races in his upgraded Sauber, while the ten drivers at Williams, Haas, Racing Bulls, Aston Martin and Alpine have scored just 21 between them.
As a result, the Swiss outfit are right back in the midfield battle, just eight points off sixth-placed Haas in the standings.
If Hülkenberg and Sauber can maintain this form, they could be in for a stunning season.
Winner - Fernando Alonso
Of those 21 points scored by Williams, Haas, Racing Bulls, Aston Martin and Alpine across the last two races, eight of them were achieved by Fernando Alonso.
Pointless in the first eight rounds, Alonso has strung together two top-ten finishes in a car that, at least in his hands, certainly looks to have the potential to score more regularly.
Despite some murmurs earlier in the season, he has clearly not lost a shred of his raw speed with age, having now reached Q3 in each of the last four races.
Alonso has still not committed to Aston Martin for 2026, but if he continues delivering as he has done over the last four rounds, surely his appetite for racing will continue long enough for one more contract.
Loser - Lando Norris
There is no escaping the fact that Lando Norris’ weekend in Canada was a disaster.
The Briton was fastest in Q1 and a leading contender for Pole, but things quickly unravelled. Q3 was a mess, as he cut the final corner on his first flying lap and hit the wall on his second, leaving him down in seventh for the race.
Starting on the hard tyres brought Norris into play later on in the Grand Prix, and while a podium was a long shot, a move on teammate and title rival Oscar Piastri seemed increasingly likely.
Norris’ lunge at the hairpin on Lap 66 saw the pair side by side down the back straight, before the Briton got the better exit out of the final chicane to launch an attack into Turn 1. However, Piastri chose to cover the inside, and whatever gap Norris thought he had seen was gone by the time he got there.
Zak Brown previously stated that the two title protagonists would collide at some point this season, but even he could not have imagined it playing out like this. Ultimately, it wasn’t even a side-by-side contact. Norris ran into the back of his teammate, was completely at fault, and, in fairness, admitted so straight away.
Questions about Norris’ maturity and ability to withstand pressure have prevailed all season, and with Piastri now holding a 22-point lead in the Championship there has never been a better or more important time for the Briton to prove his critics wrong.
Loser - Ferrari
Canada marked yet another turgid weekend for Ferrari. It was not a total disaster — only arguably the first two rounds of the season in Australia and China could be described as such — but it was once again an incredibly underwhelming weekend for the Scuderia.
Qualifying was a mixed bag, with Lewis Hamilton achieving his joint-highest Grand Prix Qualifying result of the season in fifth, while a scruffy session from Charles Leclerc landed him in P8 on the grid.
Hamilton, who has still only beaten Leclerc in one Grand Prix all season (Emilia Romagna), had a golden opportunity to reclaim some points and pride. However, he suffered early floor damage for far from the first time this season, which destroyed his race pace.
Losing ten seconds in traffic following his first pit stop, as well as about half a second per lap through damage from Lap 13 onwards, it was another disappointing weekend for the Briton, who was also “devastated” to find that he had run over a groundhog.
Leclerc, meanwhile, similarly to Norris, was brought back into play by going long on his first stint. However, his insistence to switch to “Plan C” fell on deaf ears and he was instructed to pit earlier than he would have preferred. His strategy was ultimately enough to leapfrog his ailing teammate, but, factoring in Norris’ accident, fifth place was very much the limit.
Ferrari’s consistently mediocre weekends should be enough to hold on to third place in the Constructors’ Championship. Still, for a team and drivers with such high expectations, 2025 is proving to be one disappointment after another.
Loser - Williams
Another tough weekend for Williams, whose single point courtesy of Carlos Sainz brought their total from the previous three rounds to four points, the joint fewest of any team in that period, alongside Alpine.
Saturday was a day to forget, with Sainz eliminated in Q1 after being impeded by Isack Hadjar on his final run. Alex Albon, meanwhile, lost half of his engine cover in a bizarre incident during Q2, but was able to recover and make it to Q3.
On Sunday, Sainz made moves through the field to claim a solitary point, while Albon was forced to retire with an engine issue, but not before a rather heated exchange over team radio regarding his strategy.
Williams might need to take a step back and reflect on what was working so well earlier in the season, because they have lost their way over recent weekends and need to rediscover that spark.
Loser - Lance Stroll
It was a commendable effort from Lance Stroll to return to action less than two weeks after a wrist operation, but the positives from his weekend end there.
While he is not known to relish facing the media, Stroll did not appear particularly enthused to be appearing in front of his home crowd and his performance across the weekend was perhaps reflective of his attitude.
P18 in Qualifying (which became P17 following Yuki Tsunoda’s grid drop) translated into a 17th-placed finish on Sunday.
Since his points-scoring heroics in Australia and China, a fifth place in the Miami Sprint and eighth in Qualifying in Imola are the only two occasions he has finished a session higher than P14. With Fernando Alonso finally firing on all cylinders, pressure is once again mounting on Stroll to deliver.
Loser - Liam Lawson
Another race weekend and another struggle for Liam Lawson. The New Zealander qualified ten places behind teammate Isack Hadjar (before a three-place grid penalty was applied to the latter) and was consigned to a pit lane start on Sunday.
A retirement on Lap 53 due to overheating rounded off a miserable weekend for the rookie, who has not been able to kick on since his impressive P8 in Monaco.
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