Montreal,8 June

Fernando Alonso finished sixth in today’s qualifying at the Gilles Villeneuve circuit. Felipe Massa had an unlucky afternoon ending his qualifying in Q2 when he went off the track and is down in sixteenth spot.

The poor weather we have experienced this weekend continued throughout all of qualifying and the tension was palpable right from the start of Q1, a part of proceedings the top teams usually feel quite comfortable about. At the green light, the drivers set off on dry tyres, but it was clear after just a few corners that intermediates were the correct choice. With rain still falling, Alonso was second with Massa a good fifth. It was still a case of intermediates even though the rain intensified in Q2 and two laps from the end, Massa lost control of the car under braking for turn 3 and ended in the barriers, while Alonso was second again.

In Q3, all ten cars were still on intermediates, with Alonso doing his first run on a used set, then with three minutes to go he went out with his last set of new tyres. The rain intensified towards the end making it impossible to improve on the times set earlier. Pole position went to Sebastian in the Red Bull in a time of 1.25.425.