MONTREAL — Right up to his home race, Lance Stroll’s season has been a battle since day one, starting the season off with two broken wrists and a broken toe after a cycling accident in Spain.
Doctors feared he would miss the season opener in Bahrain. Instead, the Canadian finished sixth while racing with pins in his right wrist and with his left wrist bandaged up.
“Monaco was the first race I felt 100 per cent, I’m definitely feeling much better, still a bit achy and a few things bugging me. But I’m feeling pretty much 100 per cent in the car,” Stroll said on Thursday ahead of the Canadian Grand Prix at Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve.
Overcoming doubt has been a storyline prominent in a lot of Stroll’s career. His father, Lawrence Stroll, previously had bought Force India F1 and is a current part-owner and executive chairman of Aston Martin, leaving questions marks surrounding Lance and if he deserves his spot with the team.
“You know, it’s all part of the fun,” laughed Stroll when asked if he was tired of being asked questions about his dad’s words.
The results speak for themselves: Stroll has four top-seven finishes already this season while the first time he finished above 10th last season didn’t come until October at the Singapore Grand Prix.
Of course, when driving next to double world champion Fernando Alonso, the results don’t seem as significant. Alonso already has 99 points this season and sits behind only the dynamic Red Bull duo of Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez.
“It’s a great relationship. I mean, I think there’s a good synergy in the team right now, he’s extremely experienced and he’s won championships, and brings a lot of knowledge to the team,” Stroll said.
“I really enjoy working alongside him. He’s driving at a really high level and it’s impressive to see, I think it’s great to work alongside someone that is driving at such a high level.”
The comparisons and questions don’t bother Stroll though, as he knows his journey is his own, and while having teammates who are distinguished drivers like Alonso or previous teammate Sebastian Vettel, his focus is on how he operates his own car.
Stroll’s season hasn’t been perfect, and struggles in Monaco included a Q2 exit, a rainy race where he crashed twice in two corners and getting his front wing stuck underneath the car. But even the bad race days haven’t deterred Stroll’s vision for his season.
“I focus a lot on what I’m doing when I’m here and when I’m racing, because every driver drives the car differently and every driver’s looking for something different in the car,” said Stroll.
“I definitely learn from him, but I’m also kind of doing my own thing, because I know, how I like to drive the car, what I need to get the most out of it, and to get the most out of myself. And I think that’s kind of always important to do is to be your own artist out there in a way you can kind of follow someone too much.”
Even with such a high standard set by Alonso, Stroll has nearly doubled his points already from last year, tallying 35 already while scoring just 18 last year. His highest finish this year was fourth in Australia, and would love to have an extra special home race finding his first podium of the season in Montreal.
It would be “a pretty good day” if two Aston Martins were on the podium Sunday according to Stroll – Alonso has a win in Canada previously in 2006 – but the main goal of his season thus far has been having a clean race himself, but also staying on par with Mercedes and Ferrari in the Constructor standings.
“I think it’s going to be tight between ourselves Mercedes and Ferrari every weekend. That’s been the case throughout the season, I think some tracks will be better for them, some tracks even better for us,” said Stroll.
“Hopefully, some of the upgrades we’ll bring in this weekend, we can get at them.”
Circuit Gilles Villeneuve is a track familiar to Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton, who has the most wins at the track of any other active driver with seven, including his most recent win in 2019.
Mercedes has been on the rise after a resurgent Spanish Grand Prix two weeks ago that saw a double podium with Hamilton finishing second, and Russell finishing third, after major upgrades to the car.
Aston Martin sits 18 points behind Mercedes in the constructors’ standings and hopes to use this weekend to make a statement and get ahead with big performances from both Stroll and Alonso, as the two work together in tandem instead of against each other.
“I think as teammates we’re always trying to give kind of advice to each other during the race. If we’re fighting for points, we want to score as many points as possible for the team, so I think there’s little things,” said Stroll.
“That’s how we kind of chat about it, and I think that’s one of our strengths as teammates, is we have a good relationship and I think we communicate well about what works well with the car and how we can improve the car to get the most out of it.”
The Canadian Grand Prix was won by Verstappen last year, though Hamilton won on the track six times between 2009 and 2019. It’s a circuit that has history dubbed the “Wall of Champions” when, during the 1999 Canadian Grand Prix, Damon Hill, Jacques Villeneuve and Michael Schumacher all collided there.
It is said to have one of the hardest pit exits in the sport because drivers re-enter the track in the middle of corner one causing multiple incidents. But for Stroll, Hamilton, Verstappen and many others, the track is still incredibly special and one of the favourites on the calendar.
“I’ve always loved coming here,” said Daniel Ricciardo, third driver for Red Bull, who scored his first-ever Grand Prix win in Canada in 2014. “I still remember the very first lap I did here when I was a reserve driver for Toro Rosso. Back then we would do installation laps like go out and then straight back to the pits to check that the car was all good for the start of the weekend, I remember I came on the radio and was like, ‘This track’s amazing, I love it.’
“It’s always just been a happy place for me.”
