Reuters
Montreal, June 12: Britain’s Lewis Hamilton swept to his fifth Canadian Grand Prix pole position here Saturday and piled more pressure on his championship-leading Mercedes team mate Nico Rosberg.
The triple Formula One World Champion will be favourite to win in Montreal for the fifth time, knowing he can retake the title lead if Rosberg draws a blank. The German is 24 points ahead after six of 21 races.
Hamilton’s love affair with the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, where he took his first pole in 2007, continued as he lapped with a fastest time of one minute 12.812 seconds and beat Rosberg by 0.062.
Rosberg’s second place brought him a 13th consecutive front row start, with Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel third fastest and 0.178 behind Hamilton.
Two weeks after lucking into his first win of the season in Monaco, thanks to a Red Bull pitstop bungle, Hamilton provided further evidence that his campaign is fully back on track.
Australian Daniel Ricciardo qualified fourth for Red Bull, with 18-year-old team-mate Max Verstappen fifth and Kimi Raikkonen sixth for Ferrari. Rosberg has never won in Canada, finishing runner-up for the past two years, but he refused to rule out his chances of a first win in three races.
Vettel apologised to his team after missing out on pole, and also skimming the wall at the last corner. Fernando Alonso will start 10th after Spain’s two-time World Champion signalled McLaren’s steady if unspectacular progress by reaching the final qualifying session for the third race in succession.
Compatriot Carlos Sainz brought out the red flags in the second phase when his Toro Rosso hit the feared wall. He qualified 16th but will move up a place thanks to Daniil Kvyat’s three place penalty carried over from Monaco.
