Ferrari’s Friday practice sessions at the Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve in Montreal were complicated. One of the two SF-25 cars did not even run in FP2, making the technical picture necessarily incomplete. To truly assess the car’s potential, it will be essential to wait for the final free practice session for the Canadian Grand Prix, when Charles Leclerc, who has been very confident about the weekend, will also return to the wheel. In Montreal, as in Monaco, running many laps helps build confidence to get closer to the walls.
From what has emerged so far, Ferrari showed competitive handling behavior. As anticipated before the weekend, the Canadian track has a limited number of high-downforce corners, a condition that should have helped the SF-25 cars reduce the gap from rivals. Traction is good, but the main limit emerged in rear stability during corner entry phases. The low-grip track surface and low-downforce rear wings caused excessive lightness at the rear, especially in initial corner approaches. As expected, the SF-25 continues to struggle in direction changes, particularly when lateral load transfer is more marked. However, the Italian car builds its lap time mainly in corner entry, showing a consistent pattern throughout the lap.
Comparing with Mercedes, for example, we notice that until turn 6 Lewis Hamilton is slower than George Russell. But throughout the lap, the Ferrari car constantly loses time on the straights. The engine mappings seem quite conservative, an element that could change everything in qualifying, where a closer Ferrari fight for the top is expected.
The combined free practice times show McLaren as the second force behind Mercedes. Some observers think the technical directive introduced two weeks ago in Spain might have had a stronger impact on a track like Canada, but there is no definitive evidence to support this yet. The MCL39 single-seater continues to show annoying behavior that drivers have dealt with since the start of the season.
In early rounds, it was noted that the car tended to understeer, partly due to an especially aggressive front end. This excess rotation is not new but appears accentuated at the Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve in Montreal, especially on corner entry. This trait might be mitigated by refining the setup to better balance the car.
The Red Bull situation is more complex, often struggling on Fridays before finding a solution through simulator work. However, this time Max Verstappen clearly suffered on corner entry, unable to recover the lost time on exit. The Dutchman reported instability, but not at the rear: the problem was localized at the front. The case of chicane 8-9 was emblematic, where he lost two tenths.
The ideal lap time chart is clear: Max Verstappen could ideally be ahead of Ferrari but behind Mercedes. The true benchmark on Friday was George Russell, while Kimi Antonelli’s third place (ideally fourth) confirms the silver arrows’ strong form. However, it is worth making some considerations about the Brackley team to better understand the situation.
The first is statistical: since the start of the year, Mercedes shows brilliant Friday performance but improves less than rivals on Saturday. The second concerns engine mappings: it is possible they ran more aggressively than others. This hypothesis might explain part of the advantage on fast sections, although better aerodynamic load management, reducing drag, cannot be excluded.
In terms of “lap construction,” the W16 showed behavior opposite to Ferrari and McLaren. While those two cars favor performance on entry, the gray and black cars perform best in mid-corner and corner exit. They also show some understeer on entry but recover time from the apex onward, especially in slow corners.
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