F1 Canadian GP: Verstappen clinches Red Bull's 100th F1 win

The championship leader was unstoppable in his bid to secure Red Bull's landmark victory, as the Anglo-Austrian outfit becomes the fifth team in F1 to score over 100 victories.

He beat Alonso with a winning margin of 9.5s, as the Spanish driver overcame a fast-starting Lewis Hamilton to secure the runner-up spot in the race.

Verstappen had been able to lead away from the start line relatively unchallenged, as a lightning start from Hamilton carried the Mercedes driver above Fernando Alonso for the opening array of laps.

The early battle among the front-running trio was joined by George Russell, but the Briton hit the Turn 9 exit wall on lap 12 and knocked his right-rear tyre off the rim. The debris clean-up required a full safety car, and Russell was able to rejoin the back of the field having limped back to the pits.

This did not deter Verstappen, who rocketed off into the lead on the lap 17 restart and soon began to put enough distance between himself and Hamilton, despite complaining that he was less comfortable with the hard tyre compared to the medium he had kicked off the race with.

The majority of the field had pitted under the Russell-enforced safety car, which shook up the strategic pattern as the medium-tyre starters had largely all defected to the hards. Alonso's pace on the white-walled tyre appeared to be stronger than that of Hamilton, allowing him to close in on Hamilton.

On the 22nd lap, Alonso mounted his charge having got within DRS range, and blasted past Hamilton ahead of the final corner to reclaim second place. Although Alonso's hard tyre pace was strong, Verstappen was able to edge clear by about a tenth of a second per lap.

Fernando Alonso, Aston Martin AMR23

Photo by: Jake Grant / Motorsport Images

Having complained that it was difficult to put the hard tyre into the correct window, Verstappen returned to the medium compound on lap 42 to conclude his pit strategy, giving him the ammunition to start building a lead as Alonso had taken a second set of hard tyres a lap prior.

This allowed Verstappen to start creaking open the gap to his fellow two-time champion, taking it to over six seconds with 20 laps remaining in the race. It expanded to eight seconds as Alonso received instructions from Aston Martin to lift and coast to manage his brake temperatures.

Although there was a brief chance that Alonso could start catching Verstappen over the final 10 laps of the race, with the gap coming down to 7.7s, the Dutchman shrugged off a small mistake and started opening the gap even more, with it reaching a zenith of 9.8s before settling at the eventual 9.5s at the flag.

Alonso had to maintain enough pace to ward off Hamilton, who had moved onto a softer compound of tyre amid the second round of stops. The seven-time champion began to home in on his former team-mate, taking the buffer down to 1.4s, but Alonso started to pick up the pace to extend his lead over the Mercedes.

Hamilton completed the podium, 4.5s down on Alonso, to claim Mercedes' sole batch of points as Russell eventually retired from the after-effects of his early wall-bang.

The Ferraris of Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz claimed fourth and fifth as the team executed a strong one-stop strategy, having stretched out the medium-tyre stint at the start and resisting the temptation to pit under the safety car to ensure the cars had track position.

The two switched to hard tyres at around half-distance, and the drivers tacitly agreed not to fight between themselves to get points on the board.

Charles Leclerc, Ferrari SF-23, Carlos Sainz, Ferrari SF-23

Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images

Sergio Perez recovered to sixth with his own long opening stint on hards, only making it a two-stop to fit soft tyres close to the end and snatch the fastest lap point - which he duly did so.

Williams' Alex Albon produced a measured defensive drive on a one-stop strategy to claim seventh place, holding firm from Russell and then Esteban Ocon when the Mercedes team retired the #63 car.

Ocon could not make inroads into Albon with DRS, while a wobbling rear wing threatened to derail any progress towards the end and thankfully remained intact.

The Frenchman came under attack from Lando Norris towards the end, who copped a five-second penalty for slowing down too much under the safety car to try and make room for a McLaren double-stack in the pitlane.

This dumped the Somerset-born driver out of the points, with Lance Stroll and Valtteri Bottas completing the top 10.

Canadian Grand Prix: Full race results

Cla	Driver		Chassis	Engine	Laps	Time	Gap	Interval	km/h	Points
1	Max Verstappen		Red Bull	Red Bull	70	1:33'58.348				25
2	Fernando Alonso		Aston Martin	Mercedes	70	1:34'07.918	9.570	9.570		18
3	Lewis Hamilton		Mercedes	Mercedes	70	1:34'12.516	14.168	4.598		15
4	Charles Leclerc		Ferrari	Ferrari	70	1:34'16.996	18.648	4.480		12
5	Carlos Sainz		Ferrari	Ferrari	70	1:34'19.888	21.540	2.892		10
6	Sergio Perez		Red Bull	Red Bull	70	1:34'49.376	51.028	29.488		9
7	Alex Albon		Williams	Mercedes	70	1:34'59.161	1'00.813	9.785		6
8	Esteban Ocon		Alpine	Renault	70	1:35'00.040	1'01.692	0.879		4
9	Lance Stroll		Aston Martin	Mercedes	70	1:35'02.750	1'04.402	2.710		2
10	Valtteri Bottas		Alfa Romeo	Ferrari	70	1:35'02.780	1'04.432	0.030		1
11	Oscar Piastri		McLaren	Mercedes	70	1:35'03.449	1'05.101	0.669
12	Pierre Gasly		Alpine	Renault	70	1:35'03.597	1'05.249	0.148
13	Lando Norris		McLaren	Mercedes	70	1:35'06.711	1'08.363	3.114
14	Yuki Tsunoda		AlphaTauri	Red Bull	70	1:35'11.771	1'13.423	5.060
15	Nico Hulkenberg		Haas	Ferrari	69	1 lap
16	Zhou Guanyu		Alfa Romeo	Ferrari	69	1 lap
17	Kevin Magnussen		Haas	Ferrari	69	1 lap
18	Nyck de Vries		AlphaTauri	Red Bull	69	1 lap
	George Russell		Mercedes	Mercedes	53
	Logan Sargeant		Williams	Mercedes	6
View full results