Categories: F1 News, Reports and Race ResultsFormula 1

Drivers surprised by Mercedes call

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Mercedes' decision to send its cars out on intermediate tyres in heavy rain surprised a number of fellow drivers on Friday in Canada.

Wet weather hit the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve after 45 minutes of the second practice session, with all the teams having attempted to complete as much running as possible before the rain hit. However, with the rain intensifying, Mercedes sent both drivers out on intermediate tyres and Lewis Hamilton duly crashed at the hairpin.

Asked if he was surprised to see the Mercedes cars heading out, Felipe Massa replied: “In the rain? I didn’t really see the reason to go out but maybe they saw a reason and they just went out and there was a lot of water, aquaplaning, slippery. We saw pretty well what happened with Lewis.”

Williams team-mate Valtteri Bottas was similarly surprised by the world champions' approach.

"We were also thinking about going but obviously it was way too wet," Bottas said. "The only reason you would go out I would guess is to maybe do some start practice or condition the clutch. I don't know ... for sure there was a reason for that but I think everyone saw how tricky the conditions can be."

And Nico Hulkenberg says he wasn't surprised to see Hamilton crashing where he did due to the amount of standing water.

"I think where he went off there, approaching Turn 10, the water was really deep and he was on intermediates," Hulkenberg said. "So I'm not surprised. He just had aquaplaning the whole way, so not much you can do.

"Yes [surprised]. I would have chosen full wets!"

Hamilton himself said it wasn't his call to go out in the wet weather and felt it was "not necessary".

Click here for Friday's gallery from the Canadian Grand Prix

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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.