Following on from his first win of the season last time out in Monaco, Lewis Hamilton continued to build momentum, topping the timesheets in first practice at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve ahead of Mercedes teammate Nico Rosberg.
Hamilton has previously won the Canadian Grand Prix on four previous occasions, in particular, in 2007 where the Brit took his first win in Formula One for McLaren.
The 31-year-old will be content with his opening gambit in Canada, ending FP1 0.331s clear of Rosberg, who set his fastest time on the purple-marked ultrasoft tyres whilst Hamilton set his on the red-marked supersoft.
Sebastian Vettel also set his fastest time on the supersoft tyre, ending first practice in third place, 0.488s off the pace set by Hamilton.
Red Bull will be encouraged by the pace shown by Max Verstappen, who ended FP1 just 0.798s off, setting his fastest time on the soft tyre, the hardest of the three tyres selected by Pirelli, for this weekend.
Valtteri Bottas has never failed to qualify outside the top four in Montreal but ended FP1 only sixth fastest, a tenth ahead of Force India’s Nico Hulkenberg. Carlos Sainz, Sergio Perez and Fernando Alonso rounded out the top 10.
Felipe Massa crashed heavily at Turn 1, which resulted in a fairly lengthy stoppage during the opening 30 minutes of the session. Williams later confirmed the DRS on Massa’s car did not fully close which meant he lost the rear under braking. The Brazilian only completed seven laps in the FW38 and will be hoping to get back out in the next session.
Daniel Ricciardo was 11th ahead of Jenson Button, who only managed eight laps in the McLaren MP4-31, after suffering another mechanical issue.
Only five-tenths of a second separated Rio Haryanto in 18th and Palmer in 22nd. Palmer was slowest out of the 22 runners, 3.828s off the pace.
FP2 at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve gets underway at 1900 BST.
