Antonelli’s win in Montreal made him the first driver in Formula 1 history to win his opening four Grands Prix consecutively, an extraordinary statistic for the 19-year-old Italian who has transformed a rookie season into a championship rout. But what should have been a Mercedes celebration in front of the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve crowd turned into one of the most chaotic races of the 2026 season — six retirements, a disastrous McLaren strategy call, and a stunning late-race overtake by Lewis Hamilton for second place.
Hamilton crossed the line 10.7 seconds behind Antonelli, with Max Verstappen another half-second further back in third. Charles Leclerc led the second Ferrari home in fourth ahead of Isack Hadjar, the Racing Bulls youngster who fought through multiple penalties to claim a career-best result for the Red Bull–powered squad.
McLaren’s intermediate gamble unravels in a single lap
Light drizzle in the hours before the race left teams staring at one of the toughest tyre calls of the season. With most of the field opting for slicks, McLaren made the bold decision to send both Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri out on intermediates — a call Piastri immediately questioned on the radio, with the circuit looking predominantly dry on the formation lap.
The papaya gamble was made worse by two extra formation laps, triggered when Arvid Lindblad’s Racing Bulls became stranded on the grid before the race had even begun. The additional laps allowed the Montreal asphalt to dry further, sealing McLaren’s fate before the lights had gone out.
When the race finally got underway, Norris produced the start of the afternoon, rocketing from third to first into Turn 1 and demoting Russell to third. But within a single lap the strategy collapsed. Piastri dived into the pits at the end of lap one for slicks, with Norris following him in a lap later. Both McLarens dropped to the back of the field, and neither would ever recover.
A Mercedes battle that almost ended in disaster
Antonelli inherited the lead from the McLaren stop, with Russell sitting in second ahead of Hamilton, Verstappen and Leclerc. What followed was a private Mercedes duel that swung back and forth for the next 24 laps — and very nearly ended in catastrophe.
The first key move came at the end of lap six, when Russell threw his car down the inside of Antonelli into the final chicane. The Italian responded with a lock-up so violent that he almost rammed the back of his teammate’s car. Contact was somehow avoided, and the pair began to break clear of the chasing pack.
The fight intensified through the middle stint. Antonelli reclaimed the lead at the final chicane on lap 22, only for Russell to retake it two laps later when his teammate ran wide at the hairpin. Then came the most dramatic moment of the duel: side-by-side into the final chicane, the pair made light contact, sending Antonelli skipping across the kerbs and emerging ahead. The Mercedes pit wall ordered him to give the position back, and he did so without complaint.
Behind them, Verstappen had moved past Hamilton for third at Turn 1 on lap nine, with the seven-time world champion complaining over the radio of a lack of power from his Ferrari power unit.
Russell’s heartbreak: power unit failure on lap 30
For 30 laps, Mercedes looked set for a one-two finish that would have shifted the championship picture significantly. Then everything changed.
Cresting the rise into Turn 9 on lap 30 — still leading the race — Russell’s W17 lost drive without warning. A power unit failure had ended his afternoon in the cruelest possible way. The Briton coasted to a halt at the side of the circuit, climbing out of his car to stand and watch as marshals worked to recover it under a Virtual Safety Car.
For a driver who, on the evidence of his Sprint win on Saturday and his pace in the opening stint, had every right to expect his first Grand Prix win of 2026, it was a brutal blow. Russell will leave Montreal with zero points from the race weekend after a Sprint victory that had briefly closed the gap to his teammate — a gap that has now exploded back out to 43 points.
The VSC played perfectly into Antonelli’s hands. Like almost the entire field, he pitted for fresh tyres while the field was neutralised, emerging with a healthy lead over Verstappen and Hamilton and a clear track ahead.
Retirements pile up: six cars fail to finish
Russell was the fourth of six retirements in a punishing afternoon for the grid. Lindblad’s pre-race grid failure was followed by Alexander Albon, whose race ended in a collision with Piastri — the Australian later receiving a 10-second penalty for the incident. Fernando Alonso joined the casualty list on lap 27 with a reliability issue Aston Martin later confirmed was unusual in nature.
After Russell came the worst news yet for McLaren. Norris, already running outside the points after the intermediate disaster, suffered a mechanical failure that forced the British driver out of the race entirely. Sergio Pérez followed soon after with what was described as a “bizarre” problem on his Cadillac, capping a difficult debut weekend for the American team’s Mexican veteran.
Hamilton’s spectacular Ferrari moment
With Antonelli untouchable up front, the most thrilling battle of the second half was for second place. Verstappen had held the position since his lap-nine pass on Hamilton, but Ferrari clearly fixed whatever ailed the British driver’s power unit during the pit window. By lap 55, Hamilton was back within DRS range of the Red Bull.
The move came on lap 62. Sweeping around the outside of Turn 1 in a manoeuvre that recalled his vintage years at McLaren and Mercedes, Hamilton went past Verstappen for second place — his first podium since joining Ferrari and his first runner-up finish since the 2024 season. It was the kind of pass that reminded everyone watching exactly why Ferrari handed him a multi-year deal.
The points and what’s next
The full top ten read: Antonelli, Hamilton, Verstappen, Leclerc, Hadjar, Franco Colapinto, Liam Lawson, Pierre Gasly, Carlos Sainz and Oliver Bearman. Hadjar’s fifth — despite collecting multiple penalties during the race — was the standout result outside the podium, and Colapinto’s sixth represented Alpine’s strongest weekend of the season.
In the championship, Antonelli now sits on 131 points to Russell’s 88. Leclerc moves to third on 75, with Hamilton vaulting to fourth on 72 after his charge through the field. McLaren’s nightmare leaves Norris fifth on 58 and Piastri sixth on 48 — and the team’s Constructors’ lead over Mercedes is gone. The Silver Arrows now sit 113 points clear of McLaren in the team standings.
Mercedes leave Canada with mixed feelings: a record-equalling fourth straight win for their young Italian, but with the painful sight of their other car broken down by the side of the track. The next chapter unfolds in two weeks at Monaco, where the championship’s narrative will face a very different challenge on the streets of Monte Carlo.
For now, Antonelli is the story. The kid who arrived in Formula 1 with the weight of “the new Hamilton” on his shoulders has authored an opening to his 2026 campaign that no one before him has managed. Four wins. Four consecutive Grand Prix victories. And a championship lead that, on the evidence of Montreal, looks more secure with every passing race.