Piastri responds to shock Red Bull link after big update on Max future<\/a><\/p>\nSpeaking to Sky Sports, Williams team principal James Vowles said: \u201cIt\u2019s one of the risks of this circuit. I know that sounds strange. Unfortunately there\u2019s been a few of these.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe [Albon] has hit a marmot [groundhog] and the damage is extensive from that point onwards.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe needed this session. You get 60 minutes and that\u2019s it, and to lose over half of it is frustrating.<\/p>\n
\u201cBack in the garage he\u2019s more worried about his mum, who suspects he\u2019s going to have to pay to adopt a family of marmots because that\u2019s a consequence of that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Russell was pleased with his response having trailed Antonelli in the past three races. <\/p>\n
\u201cThis feels great after a tough Miami but I never doubted myself. I know what I can do. Miami is unique but this is an amazing circuit with high grip,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt feels you are driving a proper F1 car around here, which is how it should be. It came together today.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe team have done a great job to bring things forward and there is now a big focus for tomorrow. We are making baby steps.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am not going to say we are going to fly off the line.<\/p>\n
\u201cI hope that\u2019s the case but history tells us that hasn\u2019t happened often or at all this year. McLaren have been making good starts.\u201d<\/p>\n
Russell was pleased with his response having trailed Antonelli in the past three races.Source: AFP<\/p>\n
Antonelli said his lap was \u201cquite bad\u201d and that he was thrown off by a mistake he made. <\/p>\n
He added: \u201cWe brought the upgrades so we still need to understand the package a little bit more as the balance has changed.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut it seems to have given us a bit of an edge again.\u201d<\/p>\n
ALBON HITS MARMOT IN RED FLAG CHAOS <\/p>\n
Earlier, Antonelli set the pace on Friday ahead of Mercedes team-mate George Russell in an incident-hit extended opening practice. <\/p>\n
The 19-year-old was fastest on both hard and soft tyres as he wound up on top in one minute and 13.402 seconds. <\/p>\n
This lap took him 0.142 seconds clear of pre-season favourite Russell in a session interrupted by three red flags.<\/p>\n
Behind them were the two Ferraris with Lewis Hamilton in third ahead of Charles Leclerc, and four-time champion Max Verstappen down in fifth for Red Bull. <\/p>\n
World champion Lando Norris was sixth ahead of his McLaren team-mate Oscar Piastri, rookie Arvid Lindblad of Racing Bulls, Nico Hulkenberg of Audi and a revived two-time champion Fernando Alonso of Aston Martin. <\/p>\n
Hamilton squashes retirement rumours | 01:43<\/p>\n
The three red flags came after Liam Lawson stopped his Racing Bulls car on track with gearbox problems, Albon hit a marmot and crashed and finally Esteban Ocon smacked the walls in his Haas. <\/p>\n
After much paddock gossip about his future, Verstappen was soon on top once the sole session began in earnest, lapping the track in 1:17.432 before Piastri went faster and the Dutchman responded in 1.15.895. <\/p>\n
Verstappen had suggested on Thursday that he was likely to remain in F1 if a mooted switch next year to a 60-40 split between mechanical and battery power was introduced, to replace the 50-50 in use in this first season of the new \u2018hybrid era\u2019. <\/p>\n
Most teams introduced update packages with Mercedes bringing a major set of new parts and McLaren their second. Ferrari and Aston Martin appeared to have no updates. <\/p>\n
The session was stopped by a red flag after Liam Lawson came to a halt with gearbox problems after 15 minutes, prompting a delay as his Racing Bulls car was cleared. The action resumed after five minutes. <\/p>\n
For Lawson, this was another unlucky setback following his problems in Miami, earlier in May, when a technical failure caused him to collide with Alpine\u2019s Pierre Gasly and half-flip his car. <\/p>\n
As they settled, Piastri and then Russell topped the times on a bright sunlit morning at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, the Australian responding to clock 1:14.963 and go nearly half a second clear of the Briton with Antonelli third, before Hamilton leapt to second. <\/p>\n
Albon then lost control of his Williams at Turn Seven after 28 minutes, suffering damage to the rear wing and rear wheels after smacking the barriers as he sought in vain to avoid hitting a marmot (a large ground squirrel native to north America, also known as a groundhog). <\/p>\n
Oscar on ‘flattering’ Red Bull rumours | 00:39<\/p>\n
– Mercedes revelling – <\/p>\n
After a 15-minute break, with the time lost added to the session, the action resumed and Russell promptly trimmed his time to within 0.013 seconds of Piastri\u2019s before Antonelli stole top spot only to see Russell take control in 1:14.560. <\/p>\n
Both trimmed their times, Antonelli running quickest in 1:14.392 by 0.052 with 23 minutes remaining – and Piastri third adrift by more than half a second. <\/p>\n
It was clear that the Mercedes upgrade was working and the drivers were revelling in a.high-speed rivalry.<\/p>\n
With 15 minutes to go, Hamilton rose to third, 0.36 off the pace, while Russell switched to softs to clock 1:13.850 and go top, followed by Antonelli who did 1:13.402 to regain the initiative.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"George Russell sent a fresh F1 statement in his Mercedes at the Canadian Grand Prix on Saturday, claiming…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":688320,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[2620,2095,336106,14212,64,63,239098,2065,13275,845,336109,2755,22496,3738,336111,3875,876,336110,336113,329760,21764,10115,330540,1737,825,5140,938,2041,2067,336114,16280,336103,2111,101414,42720,48825,33444,2643,336105,85,336112,336104,336107,13773,2614,336108,2753],"class_list":["post-688319","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-agence-france-presse","tag-america","tag-animal-sparks","tag-arvid-lindblad","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-battery-power","tag-canada","tag-charles-leclerc","tag-fernando-alonso","tag-flag-chaos","tag-florida","tag-four-time-champion","tag-fox-sports","tag-gearbox-problems","tag-george-russell","tag-gilles-villeneuve","tag-ground-squirrel-native","tag-hits-marmot","tag-hybrid-era","tag-james-vowles","tag-kimi-antonelli","tag-kyle-busch","tag-lando-norris","tag-max-verstappen","tag-miami","tag-montreal","tag-north-america","tag-northern-america","tag-paddock-gossip","tag-pole-position","tag-pre-season-favourite","tag-quebec","tag-rear-wing","tag-red-flags","tag-rumours-linking","tag-send-statement","tag-sky-sports","tag-sparks-ugly-crash","tag-sports","tag-sprint-qualifying-results","tag-squashes-retirement","tag-sudden-illnessmotorsport","tag-team-principal","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-update-packages","tag-world-champion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/688319","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=688319"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/688319\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/688320"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=688319"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=688319"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=688319"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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