Canadian GP: Verstappen leads Hamilton in FP1

Verstappen moved to the top of the order for the first time with 30 minutes remaining in the session, at that point going half a second faster than Hamilton.

After backing off for a lap before pushing again, the Red Bull driver went even faster to post a 1m13.302s, but Hamilton was also improving at the same time, eventually bringing the gap down to less than one tenth of a second, using the ultrasoft compound while Verstappen ran the hypersoft.

Shortly after those laps, Daniel Ricciardo moved into third on fresh hypersofts, which pushed the second Mercedes of Valtteri Bottas – like Hamilton running ultrasofts – down to fourth.

Bottas lost another place in the closing stages when Sebastian Vettel put in a late run on hypersofts, initially going seventh with his first attempt before climbing to fourth on his next try.

Kimi Raikkonen completed the top six, while Fernando Alonso claimed best-of-the-rest honours for McLaren in seventh.

Alonso and teammate Stoffel Vandoorne – who also ended the session inside the top 10 – spent the early part trading times at the top of the order with the Mercedes drivers, although the McLarens were using softer tyres.

There was a prolonged break in the middle of the session when Nico Hulkenberg's car stopped on track shortly after the hairpin, forcing a red flag.

While Renault got the German to try several different ways of getting the car going again, he eventually had to give up and climb out so a recovery vehicle could lift the car away.

Hulkenberg's teammate Carlos Sainz split the McLarens in the final order to claim ninth, while a late effort from Pierre Gasly got Toro Rosso into the top 10.

Home driver Lance Stroll was the only racer to hit the infamous 'Wall of Champions' in the opening session, clipping the barrier just inside the final 30 minutes and giving himself a right-rear puncture that he had to nurse for a full lap to get back to the pits.

Beyond that, the session was relatively incident-free until the final few minutes, when Marcus Ericsson spun at Turn 8, Sergey Sirotkin spun into the barriers at Turn 6, and Brendon Hartley went off at Turn 1, blaming a loss of downforce from following another car.

Alonso provided some late entertainment in the session as well, lunging Raikkonen's Ferrari at Turn 1, and then scrambling through Turn 2 off-line to maintain track position ahead of the 2007 world champion.

Cla	Driver	Chassis	Engine	Laps	Time	Gap
1	Max Verstappen	Red Bull	TAG	26	1'13.302
2	Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	Mercedes	29	1'13.390	0.088
3	Daniel Ricciardo	Red Bull	TAG	24	1'13.518	0.216
4	Sebastian Vettel	Ferrari	Ferrari	19	1'13.574	0.272
5	Valtteri Bottas	Mercedes	Mercedes	31	1'13.617	0.315
6	Kimi Raikkonen	Ferrari	Ferrari	28	1'13.727	0.425
7	Fernando Alonso	McLaren	Renault	27	1'13.900	0.598
8	Carlos Sainz	Renault	Renault	24	1'14.116	0.814
9	Stoffel Vandoorne	McLaren	Renault	19	1'14.311	1.009
10	Pierre Gasly	Toro Rosso	Honda	31	1'15.004	1.702
11	Esteban Ocon	Force India	Mercedes	29	1'15.071	1.769
12	Romain Grosjean	Haas	Ferrari	21	1'15.119	1.817
13	Marcus Ericsson	Sauber	Ferrari	30	1'15.386	2.084
14	Charles Leclerc	Sauber	Ferrari	30	1'15.439	2.137
15	Kevin Magnussen	Haas	Ferrari	21	1'15.579	2.277
16	Brendon Hartley	Toro Rosso	Honda	38	1'15.756	2.454
17	Sergey Sirotkin	Williams	Mercedes	30	1'15.768	2.466
18	Lance Stroll	Williams	Mercedes	16	1'16.259	2.957
19	Nicholas Latifi	Force India	Mercedes	28	1'17.145	3.843
20	Nico Hulkenberg	Renault	Renault	3