© Getty ImagesFriday To Sunday In MontrealBreaking down everything that mattered from the Canadian Grand Prix weekend
Bonjour,bonjour,commentvas-tu?
It’s time for Round 10 of the 2025 FIA Formula One World Championship. We went west, crossed the Atlantic Ocean and landed in Montreal. Liam and Isack are joined by Rafa once again for the latest instalment of the F1 Academy Championship. She’ll take part in three (!!!) races this weekend. What a trooper.
In the run-up to lights out for FORMULA 1 PIRELLI GRAND PRIX DU CANADA 2025, Liam swapped the slick tyres of his VCARB 02 for the off-road rubber of a Honda Talon. Best taxi service in Montreal?
Isack reckoned that we’d see a few moose (Mooses? Moosen? Meese?), but instead we just got a load of groundhogs. Still cute, tho. He also tried to teach Liam some basic French. It went as you’d expect.
First car out on track was Rafa’s VCARB F1 Academy machine. She finished the first (and only) practice session of the weekend in P7. Nice.
Isack and Liam were sixth and eighth fastest in FP1. Both VCARB 02 drivers looked strong throughout FP2 and FP3 and were ready to get in the thick of it for a solid points battle with the midfield.
Rafa took to the streets of Montreal to post her qualifying time, lining up P9 for the first race of the weekend. She was running in P6 with three laps to go until a lockup into turn 8 sent her off track. When she rejoined, Rafa collided with Chong and finished the race in P9, before being handed a five-place grid penalty for Race 2 and revoking her points finish. Sadly, Rafa would DNF in Race 2. In her third and final race of the weekend, Rafa finished P12, juuuuust out of the points. Next stop for Rafa: Zandvoort in August.
Hitting The Montreal Track© Getty Images
Qualifying time for Liam and Isack. Both of our drivers had never competed around Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve, so it was their first time pushing the limits for a hot lap. Liam didn’t manage to get out of Q1, falling short of the safe time by less than a couple of tenths. Isack proceeded into Q2 and THEN into Q3. His best lap was +0.968 off the pole lap of Russell, but Isack was hit with a three-place grid penalty for impeding Sainz during a hot lap.
Time for race day. Not our finest qualifying session of the year, but we still felt positive after our debrief, so let’s see what we came up with.
Liam started from the pit lane after a tricky qualifying, and Isack was in P12 after his penalty. On the race start, Isack gained a position and looked set to climb back into the points. Liam quickly caught up with the pack and was running in P14 during the midpoint of the race. He pitted on lap 40 but had to retire on lap 56 for cooling system concerns. Over on Isack’s side of the garage, he made his first pit stop on lap 14 to switch to the hard compound tyres. After a difficult time managing tyre wear in an extended stint, he saw the chequered flag in P16.
Liam and Isack weighed in on a tricky weekend in Canada:
“It’s tough, we changed the engine last night.” Liam said, “to top it off, we had a cooling issue, so our focus shifts to Austria.”
“It’s the first time this year that I felt we didn’t have the pace,” said Isack, “we didn’t pit at the right time and the pace on the hard tyre was not good enough and we kept falling back. On to Austria!”
Fan Favourite...Who Knew!© Getty Images
I know what you’re thinking: where next?
Well, friends, join Isack, Liam and the entire VCARB crew in two weeks for the FORMULA 1 MSC CRUISES AUSTRIAN GRAND PRIX 2025 from 27-29 June..
À bientôt ! À bientôt en Autriche.
Montreal Memories© Getty Images
