F1 Raceweek: Hamilton aims for Schumacher record, unlucky 13 for Ferrari – Canadian GP in numbers
Following his disappointment in Monaco last time out, Lewis Hamilton has the chance to get his Formula One title bid back on track with a history-making weekend in Canada.
The Mercedes driver missed out on Q3 in Monte Carlo after being held up behind a Stoffel Vandoorne crash and had to settle for a seventh-place finish in the race, with winner Sebastian Vettel opening up a 25-point gap at the top of the drivers’ standings.
But Montreal has been a happy hunting ground for Hamilton over the years and a strong qualifying showing could see him equal a Michael Schumacher record.
Canada has produced the longest F1 race in history and Ferrari look well-placed to end their own long wait for a win there.
Here, with the help of Opta numbers, we look ahead to this weekend’s grand prix at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve.
6 – Hamilton needs one more pole position to equal Michael Schumacher as the driver with the most in Canada (six) and one more win to make it his most successful circuit (currently five wins).
3 – Three teams have secured three consecutive pole positions in the last nine races in Canada (McLaren, Red Bull and Mercedes). No team ever has had four in a row.
2 – Before Valtteri Bottas joined Mercedes, Canada was the only circuit at which he had made the podium more than once (2015, 2016).
3 – The winner in Canada has started from pole in three of the last four races (twice Hamilton, once Sebastian Vettel).
2 – In 2017 there have not been two consecutive races when both Red Bull drivers have finished.
4 hours, 4 minutes and 39 seconds – The Canadian GP in 2011 was the longest F1 race in history. It was won by Jenson Button and was the only race in Montreal in which it has rained in the 21st century.
6 – Vettel has finished first or second in all of the first six races of the season, something he had not achieved since 2011 (9 races).
13 years – Ferrari have not won the Canadian GP since 2004, when Michael Schumacher won. The German driver accounts for six of Ferrari’s 11 wins there.
81 – Kimi Raikkonen has not won any of the last 81 races, his worst run as an F1 driver.
1 – The first race win in F1 by a Canadian driver was by Gilles Villeneuve in 1978 in the first race at the circuit which today carries his name. His son Jacques was the first and only Canadian to win an F1 World Championship in 1997.
78 – On Sunday, Jackie Stewart turns 78 – he is a three-time F1 World Champion and the oldest one still alive.
