@LandoNorris tops damp opening #CanadianGP FP1 session. #F1
Lando Norris, #4, McLaren Formula 1 Team-Mercedes, MCL38, Free Practice 1, Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Image credit to Chris Graythen/Getty Images. Norris Canadian GP FP1, 2024 Canadian GP FP1, F1 Canadian GP FP1, Canadian GP FP1 Results, 2024 Canadian GP FP1 Results.
Norris Canadian GP FP1 – McLaren’s Lando Norris topped a damp opening FP1 session at the Canadian GP ahead of Ferrari duo Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc who completed the top three.
Norris posted the session-topping benchmark of a 1:24.435 on the C5 red side-walled Soft compound and was 0.328 seconds clear of Sainz as Leclerc was a further 0.871 adrift in third.
Rain and hail greeted the drivers at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve as Montreal is forecast for wet conditions for the entirety of the weekend.
The first bit of track action was disrupted by a hailstorm hitting the track an hour before FP1 began.
The rain stopped before the session at 13.30 local time as all three sectors for 21 minutes were yellow flagged, and the pit-exit closed due to track marshals clearing as much of the standing water as possible to ensure some track running for the drivers to get used to circuit conditions and adjusting their car setups to build a baseline for the race weekend.
Mercedes’ Sir Lewis Hamilton was the first driver on track running the green-branded Intermediates for a few sighting tours as Sauber’s Valtteri Bottas had the blue-marked full Wet rubber bolted on, but he soon followed his former team-mate’s lead as it became clear that the intermediates were perfect for the conditions.
As more drivers emerged on the slowly-drying circuit, Bottas’ Sauber team-mate Zhou Guanyu caused a brief red flag by losing control of his Ferrari-powered C44 racer and clipped the outside wall at turn five with his rear-left corner.
The constant-improving conditions lap times steadily come down too, with RB’s Yuki Tsunoda, Sainz, Hamilton and Leclerc all swapping places at the top of the time-sheets.
Following a small lull, there was a flurry of activity with six minutes left of the hour-long session when a clear dry racing line appeared on track encouraging drivers to head out on the slicker tyres.
After slipping off the track at the second corner, Leclerc briefly took over the head of the leaderboard from Ferrari team-mate Sainz, before McLaren’s Norris jumped to the top with his best effort of a 1:24.425, which stood as the benchmark.
The Ferrari pairing Sainz and Leclerc followed in second and third respectively as Hamilton took fourth.
Reigning world champion Max Verstappen took fifth in his Red Bull RB20 entry and ahead of the second McLaren of Oscar Piastri who was sixth and Alpine’s Pierre Gasly who placed seventh.
Bottas was next in eighth as the Finn suffered a late spin, whilst the other Red Bull of Sergio Perez and Mercedes of George Russell rounded out the top ten.
Alpine reserve Jack Doohan was limited to just three tours taking over for Esteban Ocon in the opening session and did not register a lap time.
The aforementioned Zhou and Albon did not register a lap time.
More rain is expected for the upcoming Free Practice 2 session starting at 5pm local time in Montreal.
You can see the full Formula 1 AWS Grand Prix Du Canada 2024 Free Practice 1 Results Classification at the link: https://www.formula1.com/en/results.html/2024/races/1237/canada/practice-1.html
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