Canada 2026: pre-sprint nonsense and qualifying

Ah, sprint weekends. I wish they’d go away, but at least we will have a decent track this time. Kind of glad I didn’t bet on sprint qualifying as I probably would’ve gone for Piastri each way. Anyway…



In SQ1 a red flag emerged after an Alonso crash, although this didn’t stop him beating his team mate, yet again. He’s slated to start 16th, ahead of Perez, Stroll, Gasly, and Bottas. Gasly in particular was screwed, and wasn’t helped when Hamilton deliberately paused in the pit lane to limit the number of drivers who could make a real attempt to put in a competitive time. Lawson and Albon failed to set a time at all as their cars weren’t working.

SQ2 was mostly two by two, with the two Audis fastest of those eliminated, Hulk faster, and the two Haas slowest, Ocon being the faster. The meat in the Audi-Haas sandwich was Colapinto.

In SQ1 it was even more Noah’s Ark. By just under a tenth Russell leads Antonelli on the front row, and then there’s a couple of tenths back to Norris and Piastri. Row three is Hamilton and Leclerc (despite being two places off Norris Hamilton was within two-hundredths). Verstappen leads Hadjar on row four. Lindblad qualified in 9th which is very impressive given his lack of experience and limited practice on a silly sprint weekend. Sainz was eight-tenths further back which suggests the Spaniard either messed up his warm-up or had traffic or small error on his fast lap, but he and Lindblad were near certain to be on the back way anyway.



It’s a fairly short run to the first corner and both the Ferraris and McLarens have had decent starts, the former especially. I’m not inclined to bet, and the timing means I’m not betting on qualifying either.

The advantage Mercedes has but the very close battle between McLaren and Ferrari means picking the the likeliest chap in third or picking up a surprise front row is hard to call.

The sprint’s at 5pm and qualifying 9pm UK time.

Morris

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