We soon hurried back to our seats, for immediately after the lunch break came the the start of formula one qualifying. The stands were noticeably more packed as we squeezed in to see who might be able to make it to the top of the grid.
courtesy JInnes
F1 qualifying sessions can be a strange head game. Some drivers, for example, do short initial stints and then wait to see who responds with a similarily challenging lap time. Lewis Hamilton (the current world champion), for example, came out nearly right at the start of the session, set a lap, and then returned to the pits.
Out for another string of laps
Video snippet, F1 Practice - Click on video above to start
In the end, Hamilton and Rosberg, the two Mercedes drivers, managed (as they often do these days) once again to qualify 1-2. There was some interesting action, though: previous world champion (and currently third place in this year's standings) driver Sebastian Vettel (ferrari) seemed unexpectedly off - not really setting any sort of decent lap. Then, in a red flag situation, he passed another car on the track, and was given a five-position grid penalty. The combined result would see him starting from nearly last on the grid. Disastrous.
Meanwhile, William's Valtteri Bottas and the two Lotus teammates of Grosjean and Maldonado had a solid qualifying session, placing 4th, 5th, and 6th respectively. The other ferrari driver - Kimi Raikonnen - did much better than his teammate, qualifying in third place.
We watched hungry seagulls wheel overhead as we waited for the track to be set up for the next event - the first race of the Formula 1600 series. This open-wheeled car racing series is a classic stepping-stone for drivers working their way up through motorsport (sometimes even to formula one).
Formula 1600 cars are open-wheeled - like formula 1 cars - but are far simpler. No aerodynamic downforce aids are allowed, and the engines are relatively modest 1.5 or 1.6-litre naturally-aspirated power units.
The race was fairly clean, with an incident-free start. The top-three finishers were all local Quebecers - #90 Patrick Dussault, #2 Michel Bonnet, and #94 Didier Schraenen.
Next up, the first Ferrari Challenge race. Like the just-finished F1600 race, the race began via a rolling start (unlike F-1 with its standing start). Like the F1600 race, the start of this race was clean: a pack of galloping ferrari motorhorses just inches from each other as they wound around turns one and two directly in front of us.
Ferrari Challenge first race prep
The ferrari challenge has several sub-classes, and they all race together in a hard-to-untangle group. We paid more attention to the lead group of racers, part of the "Trofeo Pirelli" class.
A heated battle for first soon developed between the orange-and-blue car of #59 John Farano of Toronto, #77 Emmanual Anassis of Montreal and #38 Gregory Romanelli of Miami. Eventually John Farano had an incident with a red-painted concrete wall, damaging his car slightly and setting him back several positions. In the end, Gregory Romanelli crossed the line first.
