Time for another maiden winner? Six talking points for the 2024 Canadian GP

Round nine of the 2024 Formula 1 world championship is the second in North America. The 10 teams arrive in Montreal for one of the most popular rounds of the season.

But this year, Montreal’s Circuit Gilles Villeneuve could play host to a pivotal race which will give us a real indication for what to expect at the front of the field entering the middle phase of the championship and beyond.

Will Red Bull be beaten for the third time in four rounds – perhaps even by a first-time winner – or will the world champions be able to re-establish themselves as the team to beat? These are the talking points for the Canadian Grand Prix.

Are Red Bull beatable?

For the first time since the middle of 2022, Red Bull have tasted defeat twice in the last three races.

After Lando Norris scored his long-awaited first grand prix victory in Miami, Max Verstappen only narrowly held the McLaren driver back to return Red Bull to the top of the podium the next race in Imola. Last time out in Monaco, Red Bull never looked in contention for victory from their first lap out of the pits in practice as Ferrari and Charles Leclerc controlled the Monte Carlo weekend on their way to a memorable home with for their driver.

But Monaco is the ultimate outlier circuit and the RB20’s struggles on its bumpy surface and the necessary increase in ride height to deal with it had a clear impact on the team’s outright performance. At a more conventional circuit, Red Bull should expect to perform much stronger than they did in Monte Carlo.

Last year, Verstappen took pole in a wet end to qualifying before converting that into victory on Sunday. Although he won by just under ten seconds, that would actually be one of his slimmer margins of victory over his dominant 2023 campaign. The year prior, Verstappen only just beat Carlos Sainz Jnr by less than a second after the Ferrari driver tried to put him under pressure in the closing stages.

Although the chicanes, kerbs and close barriers in Montreal mean it is far from the most traditional of racing circuits, this weekend should still provide a fascinating look and what the order truly is at the front of the field.

Piastri’s opportunity?

For whatever reason, Montreal has produced more first time grand prix winners that practically any other venue on the calendar.

From the man for whom the track is now named in honour of, Gilles Villeneuve, in 1978 to Thierry Boutsen in 1989, Jean Alesi for Ferrari in 1995, Lewis Hamilton in 2007 and Robert Kubica the following year, all the way to Daniel Ricciardo in 2014, this track has blessed far more than its share of drivers with maiden victories.

With Norris finally joining the exclusive winners club last month in Miami, one a single driver racing for the top four teams in the constructors’ championship is currently yet to claim their first grand prix win – Oscar Piastri. And there are plenty of reasons to believe he has a genuine chance of becoming the latest driver to take his first win in Montreal.

Piastri equalled his career-best finish last time out in Monaco, finishing second behind Leclerc after being the closest to the Ferrari driver in qualifying. But McLaren were arguably the strongest team in Imola, the round before Monaco, where Piastri should have started on the front row – and probably even from pole – had a penalty for impeding Kevin Magnussen not dropped him to fifth.

If McLaren are able to emulate their Imola performance level around a more traditional circuit like Montreal, then both their drivers may become instant favourites for Sunday. Piastri has proven he can match and even beat Norris multiple times in his short career already, but if he can do so again this weekend, he may well be rewarded with his biggest prize of his racing career so far.

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Fresh surface, new run-off

As seems to be the trend in recent times, the Circuit de Gilles Villeneuve is the latest F1 circuit to have undergone a major resurfacing to smooth out bumps and provide better natural grip to drivers.

The operators of Parc Jean-Drapeau – the public parkland on the Isle Notre Dame that the circuit runs around – announced that a “complete resurfacing” of the race track to adhere to current FIA standards, while drainage has also been improved. The middle sector has received significant work, especially the chicane of turns eight and nine where George Russell hit the wall early on in last year’s race. That section of the circuit has also seen its asphalt run off area dug up and replaced with grass – much like Imola earlier in the season.

The last time F1 visited a circuit that was recently repaved was not very long ago – the Chinese Grand Prix at Shanghai in late April. That weekend presented challenges for drivers as beyond a simple resurfacing, some parts of the track appeared to have been coated with an agent in the run up to the race. But despite concerns from drivers and a slightly reduced level of grip, it was nothing like what those who raced at Istanbul Park in 2020 experienced following last-minute work at the Turkish circuit.

What level of grip will be available to drivers in Montreal this weekend? Will the smoother surface play more into the hands of Red Bull than it otherwise would have? Those questions will be answered this weekend.

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Perez’s performance

Heading into the Canadian Grand Prix weekend, Red Bull are expected to soon announce Sergio Perez will extend his contract with the team into a fifth season.

That would be a blow for Perez’s many rivals who dreamed of replacing him and putting their skills to the test against Verstappen. Especially the two RB drivers, Yuki Tsunoda and Daniel Ricciardo, who entered the year with every reason to think that whichever of the two of them had the strongest start to the season would likely end up being picked to replace Perez.

The 34-year-old has endured a tumultuous 12 months, to say the least, since his last win in Azerbaijan. He failed to score even half the points tally of team mate Verstappen and hasn’t even led a lap in 2024 so far, despite three non-Red Bull drivers having taken a victory over the opening eight rounds.

Although arriving in Montreal expecting very good news, Perez also heads into this weekend on the back of two consecutively disappointing weekends. He made multiple errors over the Imola weekend, finishing down in eighth while Verstappen won, before being eliminated from Q1 in Monaco and being involved in a huge accident on the opening lap which put him out of the race and destroyed his car in the process.

Can Perez turn things around and regain momentum in Montreal, or is he doomed to repeat his mid-season slump from last year?

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Resurgent Stroll?

Once again, Canada’s only representative in this weekend’s grand prix is Lance Stroll. The Aston Martin driver arrives back in his home nation with only a third of the points of team mate Fernando Alonso.

However, Stroll’s form appears to have picked up in the last few rounds of the championship. After Alonso endured a pretty torrid weekend by his standards in Imola, Stroll not only out-qualified his team mate but also secured two points by climbing from 13th to ninth in one of his best Sundays for a while. In Monaco, he reached Q2 when Alonso could not and would likely have finished ahead of him had he not ruined his weekend’s work with a silly mistake hitting the inside wall at the harbour chicane, giving him a puncture.

It’s easy to overlook that Stroll has now out-qualified Alonso for three consecutive rounds – for the first time as team mates – and is equal with the two-times world champion on Saturdays at 4-4 over the first eight weekends. Can he keep his uptick in form going into his home grand prix?

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Alpine’s civil war

The tempestuous partnership between lifetime rivals turned team mates Esteban Ocon and Pierre Gasly will officially come to an end at the conclusion of the 2024 season.

Alpine announced yesterday they had agreed with Ocon not to extend their relationship after this season, meaning he will leave the Enstone factory after five years with the team.

The move comes following a major flashpoint between he and Gasly at the Monaco Grand Prix. Ocon ended his race on the opening lap after making a high-risk attempt to pass his team mate into Portier, resulting in contact which sent him bouncing into the air. While the move could have ended both Alpine drivers’ races, Ocon came off worse and Gasly was able to take the final point in tenth.

Ocon’s willingness to risk a potential points finish for his team to try and get ahead of his team mate on the opening lap at Monaco earned him valid criticism as well as unjustifiable online abuse. It also appears to have been the last straw for his team.

Now, Ocon knows he will be leaving the team whatever happens over the remaining 16 rounds. What will that mean for his relationship with Gasly and how the pair race each other? We could get our first glimpse of the answer this weekend.

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Are you going to the Canadian Grand Prix?

If you’re heading to Canada for this weekend’s race, we want to hear from you:

• Forum: Going to the Canadian Grand Prix at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve

Who do you think will be the team to beat in the Canadian Grand Prix? Have your say below.

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