Daniel Ricciardo wins first Grand Prix in Canada.

In one of the most exciting races in Formula 1 for a long, long time, RedBull Racing Renault driver Daniel Ricciardo took his first F1 victory in Montreal at the Gilles Villeneuve circuit with Mercedes’ Nico Rosberg in 2nd and Sebastian Vettel from Red Bull in 3rd behind the safety car. This is also the first maiden double podium finish for the Red Bull Racing team.

At the beginning of the weekend, it all looked like that it would be another show of dominance by Mercedes AMG Petronas. But braking and power troubles for both drivers saw Hamilton and Rosberg lose power and Hamilton also lost his brakes leading him to retire for the second time this season on lap 48. Yet Rosberg drove his car to the podium with a fantastic drive leading the race only until the 2nd last lap of the race where Ricciardo used his DRS on the straight to take the lead.

Sebastian Vettel was very lucky to finish 3rd as on the final lap, the Williams of Filipe Massa swerved inches away from his front wing into the barrier after a collision with Sergio Perez’s Force India who was also facing problems with his Brake By Wire (BBW) system in the final stages.  Both drivers were taken to the medical center after the massive crash in turn 1. They were later discharged after a clean slate from the doctors. Perez will carry a penalty in the next race for causing the collision.

The Ferraris of Fernando Alonso and Kimi Raikkonen struggled for pace and grip throughout the race as Alonso finished 5th behind Jenson Button (McLaren-Mercedes) and Nico Hulkenburg (Sahara Force India). Ferrari got Kimi’s pit strategy wrong, and Kimi spun out at the hairpin but still continued to finish the race scoring a single point in 10th for his 200th grand prix, behind Valtteri Bottas (Williams-Mercedes), Jean-Eric Vergne (STR- Renault) and Kevin Magnussen (McLaren-Mercedes. Adrian Sutil (Sauber Ferrari) was the last car to cross the finish line in 13th after 11 drivers retired, leaving Felipe Massa (Williams-Mercedes),  Perez and Esteban Gutierrez (Sauber Ferrari) classifying as they finished more that 90% of the race.

Both Jules Bianchi and Max Chilton of Marussia Ferrari crashed out at the first chicane on the first lap as Chilton lost control of his car to destroy both cars and his 100pc race finish record in Formula 1. The question remains, if Marussia can extend the lead over Caterham or can Caterham find some place to win the prize of 30 million pounds for finishing 10th in the championships.

File photo of Daniel Ricciardo / Courtesy Red Bull Content Pool.