2023-06-16 18:27:44
The first practice session started at 20 degrees and at 1.30 p.m. local time, after rain in the morning the sun peeked through lead-colored clouds. Piste temperature at 31 degrees. Everything seemed normal.
As befits his rank, Max Verstappen was the first man on the still very dirty track, while Pierre Gasly stopped: “I can no longer shift gears,” reported the Alpine driver on the radio. The Renault engine hummed at idle. Then red flag to get the car off the track. Alpine team boss Otmar Szafnauer: “It looks like the clutch didn’t work.” Gasly had to get out.
That’s not all: Esteban Ocon’s car had mysterious power fluctuations, and the mechanics dived into the back of his car to look for the cause. A disastrous start to the weekend for the French.
The break lasted: the non-permanent circuit Gilles Villeneuve had problems with the power supply, which in turn led to the video surveillance of the track being out of action.
The FIA said: As long as this problem has not been solved, i.e. the race control cannot monitor what is happening on the track, there will be no driving. The marmots were happy and looked cheekily from the boundary walls at the deserted track.
The clock ticked down relentlessly, much to the annoyance of those teams that had brought improvements to Montreal (notably Aston Martin and Williams); or those drivers who previously only knew the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve from television (like Nyck de Vries or Logan Sargeant).
Alpine took the chance to take Gasly’s car back to the pits on a truck.
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