As a cool breeze descended over Montreal and without a raindrop in sight, the drivers settled on the grid for what was to be yet another impressive performance from current F1 champ Lewis Hamilton.

Of course, as the red lights disappeared and the race got under way, nobody knew if Lewis would keep Nico Rosberg behind him the whole way, or if Ferrari’s Kimi Raikkonen would be able to undercut one of the Mercedes cars.

It was all up in the air, until pretty much on lap 45 where Nico Rosberg was clawing his way closer to Hamilton, looking for an epic fight that never actually came.

Lewis flew past the checkered flag without even breaking a sweat (metaphorically speaking) – which he later confirmed during the podium Q&A, saying that he didn’t have an issue staying in front of his teammate.

Williams finally got the better of Ferrari with Valtteri Bottas finishing on the podium behind the two Mercedes hybrids. In fact, Williams ran a very strong race – as Massa finished P6, behind Raikkonen and Vettel.

Speaking of Vettel, wow what a race for the four-time champ! Started at the back of the grid (18th), finished P5, great stuff overall. We’re left wondering what he may have been able to accomplish had he started at the front of the grid. Could he have undercut one of the Mercedes cars? Possibly.

By the way, with Montreal being such a fast track, all Mercedes-powered teams did very well and were very had to overtake. Lotus were strong with Maldonado finishing P7 and Grosjean P10, while Force India had a P8 finish with Hulkenberg and P11 with Perez.

Red Bull on the other hand, struggled immensely with their Renault power unit, lacking in straight line speed. Kvyat finished the race 9th while Ricciardo (last year’s winner) could only cross the line 13th.

As for McLaren-Honda, horrible race this weekend – even by their 2015 poor standards. Neither car had any sort of pace, neither car finished the race. Alonso was clearly frustrated over the ‘team radio’ and with a whole bunch of fast tracks coming up, it may be a while until they manage to steal another point or two.

10 Random Things We’ve Noticed

– Interesting sequence #1: Sebastian Vettel was perhaps way to aggressive to start the race. First he goes out of his way trying to pass a very slow Fernando Alonso at the end of a long straight and ends up locking up (he could have easily wanted another 6-7 seconds or so and went by him using DRS on the last straight). Then Ferrari call him into the pits (as per improvised team strategy) and the left rear takes a few seconds longer to secure! He lost about 5 extra seconds. Brutal.

– Quick note on Red Bull and their Renault power unit. You know how in (American) professional sports they say that if you can’t challenge for a title, it’s better to bottom out so that you can get a high draft pick and rebuild, instead of being in the middle of the pack constantly? It’s true. Being in the middle of the pack, being good but never good enough, is the worst thing possible. Same with Red Bull right now. They’re stuck in no man’s land.

– Quite a few big names attending this Grand Prix. We saw Al Pacino, Michael Douglas, Michael Fassbender and Manchester United striker Javier Hernandez.

– Interesting sequence #2: Williams activates DRS on the long straight behind Red Bull – blows by as if the Renault-powered car was literally standing still. Not even Honda looks that slow!

– As Raikkonen attempts to push hard in order to have a chance of undercutting Rosberg, he spins on lap 28 and so there goes the whole race for Ferrari. Just like that. Blink of an eye.

– Speaking of Ferrari, they looked really good out there in terms of pace. Raikkonen was within striking distance of Rosberg until he spun, and Vettel drove like a mad man past everyone that stood in his way. Here’s a bold prediction: Ferrari will win at least another race before the end of the season.

– McLaren’s Fernando Alonso went on a short rant a few days ago about how F1 racing has become overly complicated and frustrating and we couldn’t agree more. You get in your car, and instead of simply going all out, giving it all you’ve got, you have to actually hold off for most of the race, if not the whole race, and worry about your tire strategy, your brake strategy, your fuel strategy. It’s freaking ridiculous. These guys are now racing each other to see which one is fastest while holding back on giving it all they have.

– Toro Rosso, the other Renault-powered team out there, had a poor race as well with rookie drivers Carlos Sainz and Max Verstappen finishing P12 and P15 respectively. This was very disappointing for those of us who were expecting to see more from them. We blame Renault though.

– Interesting sequence #3: We’re on lap 43 and Vettel is struggling a bit trying to get past the quick Force India of Nico Hulkenberg. Once he makes his move, it looks as though they collide, causing the Force India to spin but with both cars appearing to be OK. Immediately after, Vettel calls up his race engineer and asks “What happened to Hulkenberg?”, saying that they didn’t collide. Upon replay, we see the same thing. The cars didn’t touch.

– Despite looking feisty early in the race as Ericsson gave Felipe Massa a really good fight, Sauber lacked overall pace and didn’t manage to score any points. Even so, we liked what we saw from Ericsson, and that Ferrari power unit should help them bounce back in the next few races.

Montreal Race Results

1. Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes
2. Nico Rosberg, Mercedes
3. Valtteri Bottas, Williams
4. Kimi Raikkonen, Ferrari
5. Sabastian Vettel, Ferrari
6. Felipe Massa, Williams
7. Pastor Maldonado, Lotus
8. Nico Hulkenberg, Force India
9. Daniil Kvyat, Red Bull
10. Romain Grosjean, Lotus
11. Sergio Perez, Force India
12. Carlos Sainz, Toro Rosso
13. Daniel Ricciardo, Red Bull
14. Marcus Ericsson, Sauber
15. Max Verstappen, Toro Rosso
16. Felipe Nasr, Sauber
17. Will Stevens, Marussia

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