Russell beats Antonelli to Canada sprint pole
George Russell took pole position for Formula 1’s Canadian Grand Prix sprint race, beating his championship-leading Mercedes team-mate Kimi Antonelli.
Antonelli had the early edge through the sole practice session, but it was Russell who triumphed in sprint qualifying with a 1m12.965s in SQ3 to take his second sprint pole of the season.
Antonelli was 0.068 seconds adrift with Lando Norris, the top non-Mercedes driver in third, three tenths off.
Norris recovered with a strong final lap, having made an error on his first flying lap that left him languishing towards the bottom of the top 10.
His McLaren team-mate Oscar Piastri was fourth ahead of the Ferraris, led by Lewis Hamilton and the Red Bulls led by Max Verstappen.
Racing Bulls rookie Arvid Lindblad comfortably made it to SQ3 and took ninth on the grid.
Sainz gets Williams into SQ3
Williams has brought further developments to Montreal aimed at lightening its overweight car further and adding performance.
And those updates got some good early vindication courtesy of Carlos Sainz taking Williams through to the final part of qualifying in 2026 for the very first time, as he scraped through with a late flying lap in 10th in SQ2.
He ended up in that same position in SQ3.
Audi’s Nico Hulkenberg and Gabriel Bortoleto were 11th and 12th in SQ2 ahead of Franco Colapinto’s Alpine, which had just one lap in practice before a power unit issue struck and ruled him out of the rest of the session.
Haas brought its first major 2026 upgrade to Montreal, but it struggled for pace with Esteban Ocon and Ollie Bearman, the two slowest drivers to set a lap in SQ2 in 14th and 15th places.
Alonso crashes in SQ1 but advances
Fernando Alonso made a surprisingly strong start to the Canadian GP weekend, with Alonso 10th in practice and 14th in the first segment of sprint qualifying until he made a rare error.
Pushing to advance from the first part of qualifying in 2026 for the first time, Alonso locked up and went into the barriers just before the Turn 3/4 chicane, prematurely ending his session.
Alonso told Sky Sports F1 he was “too much on the limit” and became a “passenger” once he’d locked up his front tyres.
“We are a little bit behind, and we don't have the pace. We were P14, so pushing seven or eight places more than what we should have."
That caused a delay while the barrier was repaired and left a mad scramble when the session restarted for drivers to try and improve with just under two minutes on the clock.
Nobody could improve, though, with most of the drivers who went out failing to get to the chequered flag in time to start a lap.
That meant Alonso actually advanced into SQ2 in 14th place.
Not so fortunate was Pierre Gasly, who was the big-name casualty in SQ1 in 19th place.
Cadillac’s Sergio Perez was the fastest of the six drivers eliminated in 17th place ahead of Alonso’s team-mate Lance Stroll, Gasly and Valtteri Bottas.
Alex Albon and Liam Lawson couldn’t even participate in the session because of incidents in practice.
Albon struck a groundhog, which caused extensive damage to his Williams, while Lawson stopped on track following a hydraulic leak, and his team couldn’t repair his car in time for sprint qualifying.
Sprint qualifying results
1 George Russell (Mercedes) 1m12.965s
2 Kimi Antonelli (Mercedes) +0.068s
3 Lando Norris (McLaren) +0.315s
4 Oscar Piastri (McLaren) +0.334s
5 Lewis Hamilton (Ferrari) +0.361s
6 Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) +0.445s
7 Max Verstappen (Red Bull) +0.539s
8 Isack Hadjar (Red Bull) +0.640s
9 Arvid Lindblad (Racing Bulls) +0.772s
10 Carlos Sainz (Williams) +1.571s
11 Nico Hulkenberg (Audi)
12 Gabriel Bortoleto (Audi)
13 Franco Colapinto (Alpine)
14 Esteban Ocon (Haas)
15 Ollie Bearman (Haas)
16 Fernando Alonso (Aston Martin)
17 Sergio Perez (Cadillac)
18 Lance Stroll (Aston Martin)
19 Pierre Gasly (Alpine)
20 Valtteri Bottas (Cadillac)
21 Alex Albon (Williams)
22 Liam Lawson (Racing Bulls)
