FP2: Russell narrowly leads Norris and Antonelli in Canada after Stroll strikes the wall

George Russell ended Friday’s running at the Canadian Grand Prix on top as he went fastest in second practice, the Mercedes driver getting the better of Lando Norris and Kimi Antonelli in another action-packed hour.

Ahead of the beginning of the session, Ferrari Team Principal Fred Vasseur revealed that Charles Leclerc would not take part in the useful practice hour as a consequence of the chassis damage sustained during his FP1 crash.

It was his team mate Lewis Hamilton who was the first out on track, taking the responsibility of gathering as much data as possible as the lone runner to give the Maranello outfit a strong idea of which adjustments they should make overnight.

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Just five minutes in, Lance Stroll – who managed to return for his home race after missing out on the Spanish Grand Prix due to wrist pain – made contact with the barrier and snapped his suspension, forcing him to park up with a dislodged front-left wheel.

It was a tricky session for much of the field as the lack of rear grip seen in FP1 reared its head again, with a greater number of drivers trying out the C5 medium tyre instead of the softest compound. Despite the switch, the McLaren pair of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri appeared to struggle initially as they repeatedly missed the final chicane and instead took to the run-off area, a move which Hamilton also replicated, prompting him to raise his hand in frustration.

The action quietened as the majority returned to the pits, leaving Franco Colapinto with an almost clear track to continue his efforts to extract the maximum from the Alpine, although he could only find enough time for P17 before he suffered his second spin of the day.

Meanwhile, Mercedes’ George Russell was having a much smoother experience – at the halfway mark, he was over five-tenths ahead of Hamilton at the top of the timesheets, feeling far more confident on the medium tyres.

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Attempts from the rest of the field to catch up to the leading Briton were hindered by the high levels of traffic, with Colapinto again involved as both Liam Lawson and Alex Albon narrowly avoided colliding with him in two separate incidents.

Away from the midfield scuffles, Norris put together his best lap of the day to get within 0.028s of Russell’s benchmark time of 1m 12.123s as the track surface continued to evolve, but Mercedes still seemed to be the strongest team overall as Antonelli broke into the top three.

As the session began to draw to a close, the drivers switched their attention away from setting quick laps to take some learnings into the rest of the weekend and help their teams prepare for Saturday’s running.

The top three did not change as Russell and Antonelli showed that Mercedes may have rediscovered their rhythm after a tough triple header, with Norris splitting the two. Albon also looked strong for Williams in P4 as the first person behind Russell in the order to set his time on the medium tyres.

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Fernando Alonso found himself in fifth as the sole Aston Martin ahead of Piastri and Williams’ Carlos Sainz, with Hamilton, Max Verstappen and Lawson rounding out the top 10.

Isack Hadjar just missed out in P11, followed by the lead Alpine of Pierre Gasly and the two Kick Saubers of Gabriel Bortoleto and Nico Hulkenberg. Yuki Tsunoda struggled to find time and was forced to settle for P15 as Haas also experienced a lack of pace with Ollie Bearman and Esteban Ocon in 16th and 17th respectively, ahead of Colapinto.

The drivers and teams will now look over their data from Friday's sessions and return for the final practice hour at 1230 local time on Saturday at the Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve.