Max Verstappen would only have had to be a thousandth of a second faster in qualifying in Montreal to be on pole, but he can also live very well with P2
Nothing like this has happened since the 1997 season finale: George Russell and Max Verstappen crossed the finish line at the same time in qualifying for the 2024 Formula 1 race in Canada, so in the end it had to be decided who had set the fastest time earlier. In this case, it was Russell
Verstappen, who had taken every pole this season before Monaco, had to settle for second place behind the Mercedes driver. However, the Dutchman is happy to accept this in view of the problems he has had so far this weekend – there is no trace of anger that he did not manage to secure his eighth pole of the season.
“Of course it’s great when you set the same lap time, but if you look at their pure pace, then I’m happy to take second place,” says the world champion. After all, Mercedes had already hinted at its potential in the third practice session – and then underlined it in the first qualifying sections.
Verstappen, on the other hand, struggled in Q2 and was not exactly confident in eighth place going into the final section – one and a half tenths slower and he would have been stuck like Ferrari. The gap to Russell was more than eight tenths of a second.
“When I saw their lap time after Q2, I thought there was no way I could do that,” says Verstappen. But Mercedes were not quite able to maintain their performance in Q3. Instead of 1:11.742 as before, Russell was “only” able to set a time of exactly 1:12.000 minutes in the first attempt.
Marko: Warm-up lap too fast
Verstappen, on the other hand, improved from 1:12.549 to 1:12.358 minutes in the first Q3 attempt and then scratched off exactly 0.358 seconds in the second attempt to achieve the smooth 1:12 time like Russell.
This was only enough for second place due to the later lap, but Red Bull is still satisfied: “Considering what happened yesterday, we are actually doing well,” said motorsport consultant Helmut Marko on ServusTV.
But of course, with such close gaps – or no gaps at all – you can always ask yourself where one or two thousandths might have been lost. “I think our warm-up lap was too fast,” says Marko, looking for an explanation. “That was obvious, he lost his tires in the last sector. “
The laps in direct comparison
Looking at the sector times, Verstappen was actually even faster than Russell in the final sector. The Red Bull driver completed the section in 29.098 seconds, Russell in 29.151 seconds, 53 thousandths slower than Verstappen.
He also lost 136 thousandths to the Dutchman in sector one, but made up for the 189 thousandths lost in the second sector with pinpoint accuracy.
However, if you now put the laps on top of each other, you can see that Russell gained time on Verstappen, especially on the long straight after the hairpin, but then lost ground again in the final chicane
The very definition of ‘fine margins’ F1 CanadianGP pic.twitter.com/CZTsJQpu7r
– Formula 1 (@F1) June 8, 2024
“Above all, they are two or three km/h ahead of us in all three speed measurements,” said Marko, recognizing the new danger posed by Mercedes. “So that shows that they are also doing well aerodynamically.”
However, the Austrian assumes that Red Bull will have a better race trim than the Silver Arrows on Sunday. Then Red Bull could still emerge victorious from the Canadian Grand Prix after a difficult start.
“In general, the weekend was a bit difficult from our side. We had too many small problems,” says Verstappen. “We obviously tried to get the best possible balance with the car. I think we had a decent balance in qualifying, I was happy with that, but we just need cleaner weekends without problems. That helps. “
Car better than in Monaco
However, it also helped that the car seems to handle much better than in Monaco, where the car had difficulties on the kerbs in particular. Although these also exist in Montreal, it is still easier for Red Bull this weekend, says the Dutchman.
“In Monaco you are much slower, so driveability and mechanical grip are very important. Aerodynamics play a bigger role here,” he explains. “Of course, there are still a few places where you have to drive over kerbs or have a few bumps, but we know our problem areas and simply have to work on them.”
“That’s why second place here is okay. “
