MOTORSPORT: Formula One in seventh heaven

New-look Montreal podium takes season to even greater heights
Now it's seven different winners in the first seven Formula One races of the year, another record, and today's victor in Canada, Lewis Hamilton, has taken the world championship lead.

Rising stars Romain Grosjean and Sergio Perez joined Hamilton on the podium in Montreal. It was the second trip to the podium for both the young Frenchman and Mexican this season -- and Perez came from 15th on the grid. It will be no surprise if either or both make it to the top step before the end of the season.

Fernando Alonso went from race leader to fifth in the closing laps in Canada, finishing behind Sebastian Vettel as Ferrari and Red Bull wrongly gambled on one-stop strategies.

McLaren got the strategy spot on with two stops for Hamilton, which gave him fresher rubber in the decisive final stages.

Australian Mark Webber had an early engine hiccup and Red Bull called him in for this first stop ahead of schedule and he finished seventh, but little more than 15 seconds behind Hamilton and close behind Nico Rosberg's sixth-placed Mercedes.

Australian youngster Daniel Ricciardo had a spin late in the race but finished 14th, ahead of Toro Rosso teammate Jean-Eric Vergne, and set the fourth fastest lap of the race.

Hamilton elevated an already stellar season to new heights with a victory he stopped short of branding his best but which must rank among his finest. It was in Montreal in 2007 that he scored his maiden victory and this was his third win in five starts there. He now heads Alonso in the championship by two points, but the season is barely one-third over, with 13 races to go -- the next on another street circuit at Valencia in Spain.

Hamilton's McLaren teammate Jenson Button has mysteriously lost his way in the past four GPs after winning the season opener in Melbourne. Button finished a lap down in Montreal today after winning last year's epic race on the picturesque circuit that has become such a favourite with the drivers it is rivaling Monaco, where Webber won two weeks ago.

Button has dropped to eighth on the drivers' scoreboard, 43 points behind Hamilton -- after last season becoming the first teammate to beat Hamilton in the championship.

While Lotus driver Grosjean and Sauber's Perez loom as likely winners soon, two of the six world champions in the field, Grosjean's teammate Kimi Raikkonen and the great Michael Schumacher, are still chasing a victory this season.

Raikkonen was eighth in Montreal, while Schumacher retired with a rear wing failure.

Montreal not so magic for Aussies
Mark Webber dropped from equal second to fourth in the world championship in Canada but he and Red Bull Racing were relieved that he salvaged six points from the race.

"With Mark, again we were running okay early on. He had an engine hesitation in the first few laps, but then he settled into a good rhythm," team principal Christian Horner said. "Again we were heavy on the tyres towards the end of the stints and it was clearer with Mark to go to a two-stop earlier, but unfortunately the one-stoppers managed to get ahead.

"It was a tactical race, a tricky race, but nonetheless we have still managed to salvage respectable points."

Webber -- who had started fourth after qualifying behind Vettel, Hamilton and Alonso -- said: "I knew it was going to be mixed up today, but not that mixed up.

"In the first 10 laps we had a small issue with the engine, which we had to manage, but then I settled into the pace. We pitted and came out behind the one-stoppers. It's hard to get it right here -- if you push to try to pass you kill the tyres, but if you wait then you find you're on the same strategy and finish behind them anyway.

"I think ultimately we were quick at times today and it's good that we finished in the points. With hindsight we could have done a different strategy, but it's easy to say that now. I've had worst days than today."

Toro Rosso team principal Franz Tost said its Ferrari-engined cars had lacked pace throughout the Montreal weekend and it needed to step up development.

"Daniel Ricciardo had a good start, but lost positions at Turn Two, and from then on there was a gap to the Force India cars from which he could never recover," Tost said. "[However] his pace was not bad, as can be seen by the fact he set the fourth fastest race lap."

Ricciardo, who finished in the same position he started, said it was now important for Toro Rosso to work harder to improve rather than get downhearted.

"Our pace is simply not enough to crack the top at the moment," Ricciardo said. "I got a good launch off the line but there was nowhere really for me to go, so I opted to go down the inside at turn one, which put me on the outside of Turn Two, where I tried to go around a few of the guys in front of me.

"But there was not as much grip there as I had expected and this cost me a few places. So from then on, I had some work to do as it put me on the back foot.

"From mid-race to the end I could not match the pace of those I was racing against.

Lowndes has been involved with the Australian Road Safety Foundation as well as the "V8 Supersafe kids' road safety program" and recently launched a new road safety initiative called Team Lowndes in his adopted state, Queensland. Now 38 and fourth in this year's V8 Supercar Championship as its heads to Darwin this week, Lowndes also has been an ambassador for Violence Against Women and for almost 10 years for the RSPCA.

"This is a totally unexpected and tremendous honour ... it's not something you ever think about [getting]," Lowndes said. "I am very flattered and slightly humbled by this. I certainly didn't see it coming.

"To be honoured by your fellow Australians in this way is pretty special and I appreciate very much everyone's support both today and right through my career. Road safety is the number one social issue we deal with every day of our lives, and it's something we can never stop working to improve."

Honda hat-trick in IndyCar
Lanky Englishman Justin Wilson is the latest winner in the IndyCar series, as Honda-engined cars again finished one-two at Texas Motor Speedway after Chevrolet's early domination of the season.

Wilson took victory after Graham Rahal got loose and brushed the wall but still finished second, with Australian Ryan Briscoe the first of the Chevrolet-powered finishers in third place for Team Penske. Briscoe set the fastest lap of the race.

Honda has now won three straight races, starting with the all-important Indianapolis 500, after Chevrolet's success in the first four rounds, including three consecutive victories by Australian Will Power in another Team Penske entry.

Power finished eighth in Texas after leading 24 laps but he and the third Penske driver, seventh-placed Brazilian Helio Castroneves, were both a lap down at the chequered flag. However, Power stretched his series lead from 26 to 36 points as New Zealander Scott Dixon, last week's winner in Detroit, was classified only 18th in Texas after a crash.

Power came in for some strong criticism from another Brazilian, Tony Kanaan, for blocking in the first race with the new, wide-bodied IndyCars on a higher banked oval since the death of two-time Indy 500 winner Dan Wheldon in Las Vegas at end of last season.

Briscoe, who led four laps before Rahal took the lead, is eighth in the series on 177 points to Power's 256.

A worry for organisers trying to revive the standing of Indycar in the eyes of the American public must be that no American driver has yet won this season.

Ambrose gains two places in Sprint Cup
Australia's NASCAR racer Marcos Ambrose moved up two places in the Sprint Cup standings with his 13th place finish today at Pocono, Pennsylvania.

Richard Petty Motorsports driver Ambrose is now 17th in the series after Joey Logano became the youngest winner at Pocono at 22 years and seven days. It was Logano's second victory in a 125-race Cup career, but it had been three years and 104 starts since the Joe Gibbs Racing driver's maiden win. He also ended a 30-race winless streak in the Cup for drivers starting from pole position.

Today's victory was Toyota's fourth in the series this year and Logano and veteran Mark Martin delivered a quinella for the Japanese manufacturer, as reigning series champion Tony Stewart, five-time champion Jimmie Johnson and Denny Hamlin rounded out the top five.

Ford driver Matt Kenseth has taken the series lead, 10 points clear of Chevrolet star Dale Earnhardt Junior, while early season leader Greg Biffle's 24th place at Pocono, his worst finish in his Ford this year, has dropped him to third in the standings.

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