It took a while to get going but the Canadian Grand Prix finally came to life in the closing laps as differing strategies unfolded. Lewis Hamilton became the seventh race winner of the season after two-stopping. Fernando Alonso’s gamble on making just the one stop proved expensive, while Sebastian Vettel minimised the damage of taking the same route by making an unscheduled late stop.

Sebastian Vettel claimed the 32nd pole of his career in a close qualifying session that could have seen any one of several drivers claim the top grid slot. In the end, his time of 1:13.784 gave him a full three tenth’s advantage ahead of Lewis Hamilton who starts alongside him on the front row, with Fernando Alonso and Mark Webber lining up behind them.

Montréal is a good-looking city. It has the 400 year-old charm of ‘Vieux Montréal’, which sits in surprising harmony with the grid patterns and skyscrapers of the modern city. It’s also a popular venue with the paddock and the city embraces Formula One, just as Formula One embraces the city.

The Canadian Grand Prix, a perennial favourite on the F1 calendar makes it’s 49th appearance this weekend. With five decades of events to look back on there should be a question to suit everyone… how many of these events do you remember?

With the European-leg of the season barely under way, Formula One makes its first pilgrimage across the Atlantic of the year, to Montreal, Canada. Last year’s race was severely delayed by the weather but culminated in a dramatic victory for Jenson Button as Sebastian Vettel made one of his few mistakes in 2011 to gift the lead on the final lap.

After four hours and four minutes, Jenson Button was gifted victory by Sebastian Vettel on the very last lap. The World Championship leader had been in control throughout but with just half a lap from victory, and with Button closing in, the German ran wide on to the wet part of the track and that was enough to hand the McLaren driver the initiative….