The Spanish Fernando Alonso (Alpine), double Formula One world champion, set the fastest time this Saturday in the third and last free practice for the Canadian Grand Prix, the ninth in the World Championship, which was held, in wet conditions, on the Gilles circuit Villeneuve de Montreal where his compatriot Carlos Sainz (Ferrari) set the tenth time and the Mexican Sergio Perez (Red Bull), the eighth.
In the best of his fifteen laps, Alonso covered the 4,361 meters of the wet Montreal track, with an intermediate tire, in one minute, 33 seconds and 836 thousandths, 53 less than the Frenchman Pierre Gasley -of which it was announced this Saturday that next year it will continue in Alpha Tauri and that it turned 18 times- and with a 55 advantage over the quadruple German world champion Sebastian Vettel (Aston Martin, 17 laps), two drivers who achieved their times with the same compound as the Asturian double world champion and who finished the session in second and third position, respectively.
Alonso, 40 years old, who was one of the first to switch from the extreme rain tire to the intermediate compound, set the best time in the last free session on the track in which in 2006 -the year he revalidated the title, with Renault- he achieved a of his 32 victories in the queen category. Sainz – who changed the engine of his Ferrari, but will not suffer any penalty -, who repeated the route of the artificial island of Notre Dame 18 times, set the tenth time, also with the intermediate, nine and a half tenths behind his compatriot, placing tenth in the time table, behind the first two in the World Championship, the Red Bull drivers.
the dutch Max Verstappen (Red Bull), who leads the World Cup with 150 points, scored the ninth time, just behind his teammate, the Mexican Sergio Pérez, who is second in the general standings, 21 units away.
‘Checo’ turned ten times, the same as ‘Mad Max’ and was 662 thousandths behind Alonso, who was almost eight tenths behind the leader of the championship, in a session that will only be indicative if the race is also held in the wet. qualifying, which will order the starting grid for this Sunday’s race; and that it will start at four in the afternoon (ten at night in Spanish peninsular time; 8:00 p.m. GMT).
The Monegasque charles leclerc, Sainz’s teammate at Ferrari and third in the World Championship -34 points behind Verstappen- did not set time, because he did not even go out on the track. He had nothing to gain: after suffering a first penalty of ten places on the grid, for changing the control unit of his power unit, this Saturday it was announced that he also replaced the turbo, penalizing another ten places; and, whatever happens in the main qualifying, he will start from the bottom of the starting formation.
