New Delhi: George Russell has taken his second consecutive pole position at the Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve, as he edges past Max Verstappen, the defending champion since 2022, in the Canadian Grand Prix. The Briton took home the pole position at the very end, beating the Dutch driver’s best effort by 0.16 seconds. The defending world champion had himself taken the pole position for Sunday’s race from McLaren’s Oscar Piastri.
Russell’s lead in front of Verstappen comes just two weeks after the duo crashed in the Spanish Grand Prix. In Barcelona, Verstappen slammed his car into Russell’s side in a furious outburst that he later acknowledged wasn’t correct. Verstappen was close to having a one-race ban, as the clash gave him 11 penalty points, just one away from the limit. While Piastri starts in third place, it was a forgettable afternoon from his teammate and championship contender, Lando Norris, who will start Sunday at seventh place, behind Mercedes’ Kimi Antonelli, Ferrari’s Lewis Hamilton and Aston Martin’s Fernando Alonso, who delivered one of his best performances of the season.
Oscar Piastri in the other McLaren, dominated the first part of the last qualifying round. In contrast, Lando Norris’ first flying lap in Q3 was removed due to track limits after he missed the chicane. At this point, however, Verstappen executed his first flying lap flawlessly, surpassing the world championship leader by 0.025 seconds. With less than seven minutes remaining, Charles Leclerc was 0.481 seconds behind Verstappen and a far-off provisional third.
Both Russell and Kimi Antonelli, in their Mercedes, though, accelerated, and the Ferrari driver was quickly moved lower down the order, resulting in a temporary lockout of the Silver Arrows’ second row.
The closing laps were then an exciting run. Leclerc first came up behind the Frenchman and almost collided with the wall. He managed to save the vehicle but was unable to improve his lap and seemed to blame it on the foul air coming off the rear of Isack Hadjar’s Racing Bulls. Verstappen appeared to be on track to start in the top spot again in 2025 after Piastri beat his provisional pole time. However, Russell appeared out of nowhere, as the top two cars used the medium tires on the MCL39s to outshine the season’s dominant McLaren cars.
After his early Q3 blunder, Norris, who had looked good earlier in qualifying, at least managed to get a time on the board, but his third attempt was unsuccessful. He starts ahead of Leclerc, Hadjar and Williams driver Alex Albon.
Russell was also in the top in Q2, finishing the middle session with a lap time 0.029 seconds faster than Norris’s second-fastest performance. The biggest surprise was that Alonso, who has been having a rough season, made it into the top 10 that proceeded to Q3, even though the drivers from the top four teams (excluding Yuki Tsunoda) were spread out among them. In Q2, he recorded the sixth-fastest time.
Franco Colapinto, who has struggled since taking Jack Doohan’s place at Imola, had a crucial qualifying session. After Austria, Alpine will evaluate its driver roster, so Colapinto must generally catch up to Gasly’s pace. Given Tsunoda’s 10-place grid drop earlier in the day after the Red Bull driver passed him during red flag conditions in FP3, the Argentine driver will start a position higher than where he is qualified, even though he did not make it to the top 10.
However, since joining Red Bull before the Japanese Grand Prix, Tsunoda’s qualifying performance was the closest he has come to Verstappen’s. He will now, however, start the race on Sunday in last place. The only teams with two drivers that made it to Q3 were Mercedes, McLaren, and Ferrari; Nico Hülkenberg finished 13th, ahead of the Haas duo of Esteban Ocon and Ollie Bearman.
With five and a half minutes remaining in the first quarter, Albon’s Williams’ engine cover fell off, leaving debris all over the back straight, prompting the red flag to be raised. With a 0.034-second advantage over Verstappen, Alonso had the fastest time at the moment. Albon appeared to be getting better before the bodywork was removed from the car, but both Williams drivers were in the drop zone along with Pierre Gasly, Bearman, and Hülkenberg.
Williams was able to reassemble the car during the halt, but it had to be a quick fix because the debris was easily cleaned up. During that red flag, Norris was seated way down on the timesheet. The Briton was only in 12th place at the moment, between Liam Lawson and Colapinto, while Piastri was in third. Norris, though, came back, setting the fastest time in Q1, with Colapinto going to the top 10 stage.
Sainz and Hadjar had a near-miss during the last flying laps, with the Williams driver accusing the Racing Bulls driver of obstructing him over the radio. Sainz lost by 0.020 seconds to Gabriel Bortoleto, who was eliminated in 17th place. After the qualifying is over, the stewards will look into the incident. Impeding usually results in a three-place grid decline. Lawson, Pierre Gasly, and local boy Lance Stroll also failed in the early part of the qualifying.
