Canada 2026
Round 5 of 22: an iconic race, a rough broadcast, and BTS with Williams
I would move to Montreal in a heartbeat. I lived here for a month in 2023 while training for a cross-country ski race, which included lapping Circuit Gilles Villeneuve (not sure that was allowed).
Montreal feels like home.
This was a massive sports week for the city. The PWHL’s Montreal Victoire won their first title Wednesday night, and showed up to Cadillac’s garage with the Walter Cup (Walter of Mark Walter, who owns both the PWHL and Cadillac F1 Team).
Thursday night I watched the Habs dominate Game 1 at my favorite restaurant, Mano Cornuto. We won’t talk about Game 2 on Saturday, but the team returns home tonight for Game 3. Allez.
Enter the main event: the Canadian Grand Prix.
I spent the weekend with Williams and their title sponsor Atlassian, diving deep into the data and decisions surrounding an F1 weekend. F1 produces 650 terabytes of data in a single weekend, so there’s a lot to learn.
I was the only creator amongst a select group of journalists, and I loved the change of pace. I picked their brains on the state of journalism, how press trips work, and their methods for getting solid sources.
One of my favorite things about being an F1 creator is the variety each different race weekend brings. I didn’t have another Miami in me so soon.
When you’re surrounded by a bunch of creators, there can be pressure to churn out trendy, aesthetic, and viral-leaning content. It’s anxiety-inducing and I don’t necessarily thrive in that context. Thinking through a few well-researched deep dives is more my speed.
I got to watch practice from the Williams garage, interview Technical Director of Engineering Matt Harman, have dinner in Williams’ hospitality (they played exclusively Noah Kahan’s discography during my three hours there — iconic), and spend quality time with the incredible Atlassian team.
My history with Atlassian runs deep: they were my client when I was an investment banker, I lived in Jira for years as a product manager, and I worked with them in Austin and Vegas last year.
I also of course caught up with F1 Academy, visited their paddock (by boat!), interviewed Jade Jacquet and Jamie Chadwick, and walked the grid ahead of Race 2. They had three great races this weekend. Right now it’s Alisha Palmowski’s world and we’re all living in it.
Now, onto Canada’s first-ever sprint weekend. The race itself aged me by a few years (in a good way).
Media day started off strong with Lewis Hamilton coming out and saying, in perhaps his most unequivocal manner yet, that he’s here to stay. And to “get used to it.” He put an exclamation point on that statement with a stellar P2, his highest Ferrari finish yet. Needless to say, I’m over the moon.
Here’s how the results shook out.
SPRINT
DNF = Fernando Alonso
RACE
DNS = Arvid Lindblad
DNF = Checo Perez, Lando Norris, George Russell, Fernando Alonso, Alex Albon
Quali summary
Race summary
My Top Takeaways
Kimi and George are much more evenly matched than the scoreboard shows. Kimi sent it into seemingly every corner this weekend, and is racing like he has absolutely nothing to lose. I love that. But the now-43 point gap between him and George doesn’t accurately represent what George is bringing to the table. He had sprint pole, sprint win, quali pole, and was leading the race before his retirement. 43 points is a big hill to climb, but never say never. He’s had rough luck.
I absolutely love this track. And the drivers seem to, too. The close walls, long straights, hairpin, wall of champions. It’s beautiful. Canadian fans always bring good vibes and this weekend was no different.
What was up with the F1TV broadcast? F1’s broadcast is one of the sport’s greatest and most important assets. They do an impossible and usually impeccable job of following 22 cars in real time. This race was an unfortunate exception. It felt like Alex and Jolyon never had the shots or replays they needed (and had to keep saying “we’ll see if we can get that on the screen”), we got information 30+ minutes late, barely heard any radios, and missed some great battles. Did anyone else feel the same? Woof.
Canada MVPs
Lewis Hamilton. He was on fire all weekend. I’m loving his energy. I shared a stairwell with him (and his entourage of 10+ Ferrari team members, bodyguards, and photographers) this weekend. The aura is off the charts.
Alpine, and particularly Franco Colapinto. They’re really enjoying those upgrades. Franco is on a strong upward trajectory and I hope it continues.
Stat of the Week
The gap between George and Kimi was the exact same (0.068s) in both sprint quali and quali – shoutout Will Colahan for alerting me to that fact!
Radio of the Week
So good to see Lewis back up there. He’s seemed happier, lighter, and more confident this season. Also, his mom is definitely a good luck charm. This sweet video is worth your time.
A close runner-up was Toto Wolff’s “Kimi, concentrate on the driving please, and not on the radio moaning” during the sprint. If anyone knows how to manage two championship-contending teammates, it’s Toto.
We’re finally back to regularly scheduled programming as we enter the European swing. After a massive shift in regulations and only two races in eight weeks, it’s been a strange start to the season to say the least.
Time for the momentum we know and love (though not stoked about the 6am race starts for us PST folks). Nevertheless, we persist.
My Camera Roll
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