Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsFormula 1

Hamilton tops first Canadian practice despite spin

Lewis Hamilton set the fastest time of FP1 for the Canadian Grand Prix despite spinning during the opening session.

A number of drivers struggled with low grip levels during first practice, with the soft tyre proving difficult to warm up in relatively cool conditions. Hamilton topped the times throughout the session but lost the rear of his Mercedes at low speed, spinning at the hairpin and being left facing the wrong way in the middle of the circuit.

Hamilton recovered the car and eventually lowered his best lap down to a 1:16.212, leaving him 0.415s clear of team-mate Nico Rosberg. On a track where the power unit has a major influence, Mercedes was dominant and Hamilton was 1.5s clear of third-placed Romain Grosjean.

The top four were all Mercedes-powered cars with Nico Hulkenberg just 0.15s slower than Grosjean in the Force India. Sebastian Vettel was fifth for Ferrari - 1.7s adrift of Hamilton's best - but limited his running during the early part of the session with Ferrari trying to manage its power unit mileage as it introduces an update this weekend.

Felipe Massa was sixth for Williams ahead of Daniil Kvyat's Red Bull. While Renault is expecting to struggle, it had both Kvyat and Max Verstappen's Toro Rosso in the top ten, while Honda will be similarly encouraged to see Fernando Alonso end the opening session in ninth place.

Valtteri Bottas was 11th but another driver to have a spin during FP1, with the Finn losing control at Turn 6 and completing a full 360-spin in a cloud of tyre smoke before continuing. Carlos Sainz followed suit in the Toro Rosso moments later, spinning after carrying too much speed in to Turn 1.

With one McLaren finishing the session in the top ten, Jenson Button was down in 15th place after more reliability concerns. Button completed just two laps in the opening half an hour of the session - when teams get a free set of tyres which must be returned after 30 minutes - but recovered later on to complete 25 laps in total.

Click here for technical analysis of the braking challenge at the Canadian Grand Prix

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Pos	Driver	Team	Time	Laps
01	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	1:16.212	34
02	Nico Rosberg	Mercedes	1:16.627	38
03	Romain Grosjean	Lotus	1:17.721	35
04	Nico Hulkenberg	Force India	1:17.871	34
05	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	1:17.905	25
06	Felipe Massa	Williams	1:17.985	28
07	Daniil Kvyat	Red Bull	1:18.021	30
08	Pastor Maldonado	Lotus	1:18.026	41
09	Fernando Alonso	McLaren	1:18.128	34
10	Max Verstappen	Toro Rosso	1:18.257	24
11	Valtteri Bottas	Williams	1:18.325	40
12	Kimi Raikkonen	Ferrari	1:18.439	26
13	Sergio Perez	Force India	1:18.503	28
14	Daniel Ricciardo	Red Bull	1:18.775	24
15	Jenson Button	McLaren	1:18.786	25
16	Felipe Nasr	Sauber	1:18.948	30
17	Carlos Sainz	Toro Rosso	1:19.065	23
18	Marcus Ericsson	Sauber	1:19.165	32
19	Roberto Merhi	Manor	1:20.616	33
20	Will Stevens	Manor	1:20.624	27

Andrew Lewin

Andrew first became a fan of Formula 1 during the time when Michael Schumacher and Damon Hill were stepping into the limelight after the era of Alain Prost, Nigel Mansell and Aryton Senna. He's been addicted ever since, and has been writing about the sport now for nearly a quarter of a century for a number of online news sites. He's also written professionally about GP2 (now Formula 2), GP3, IndyCar, World Rally Championship, MotoGP and NASCAR. In his other professional life, Andrew is a freelance writer, social media consultant, web developer/programmer, and digital specialist in the fields of accessibility, usability, IA, online communities and public sector procurement. He worked for many years in magazine production at Bauer Media, and for over a decade he was part of the digital media team at the UK government's communications department. Born and raised in Essex, Andrew currently lives and works in south-west London.