Canadian Grand Prix Qualifying: Vettel BEATS Hamilton to Pole

Sebastian Vettel takes pole position for Ferrari at the 2019 Canadian Grand Prix, beating Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton in to P2.

This year has seen Mercedes dominate F1 once again, with the front row of the grid of every Grand Prix (bar one) seeing a Mercedes – usually Hamilton’s Mercedes – on pole position. But not for the 2019 Canadian Grand Prix.

For the firts time since the summer of 2018, Sebastian Vettel has taken pole position with a lap 0.206 seconds faster than Hamilton could manage.

Behind the front two of Vettel and Hamilton it’s actually Leclerc in the second Ferrari in third place with Daniel Ricciardo in the Renault alongside in fourth, an you’ll have to look at the third row of the grid to find Hamilton’s team mate Bottas, and even then you’ll find him starting in sixth spot, with Red Bull’s Gasly in fifth.

Behind the front three rows it’s seventh place for Hulkenberg in the Renault, eighth and ninth for the McLarens of Norris and Sainz and Magnussen in the Haas starting tenth.

It’s a properly mixed up grid for a change, partly because Ferrari has an actual top speed advantage on the long straights of Montreal’s Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, but Mercedes could be being a bit cautious with a new engine which failed in Stroll’s Racing Point ahead of qualifying.

But it’s the race that counts.