Mika's comment at the arrival to Canada: "Despite being a permanent road course, the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve has a street circuit feel because the barriers are so close to the track. Because it's only used once a year it's extremely dusty when we go out for Practice on Friday. However I like it here and after the problems I experienced in Monaco I'm looking forward to being back at the sharp end this weekend".

The Qualiying session: Heidfeld opened the race 10 minutes after start, and Mika Häkkinen was surprisingly one of the very first cars to enter the track. He took naturally pole position immediately with -1.67 second better than Button. Later on beat Coulthard his Team mate's time with 0.45, Schumi didn't succeed in taking a temporarily pole position with his first try, but he did succeed in beating Mika's time and took a temporarily second place, Barrichello a third. Mika's second try could have given him the pole, during the fast lap he was as much as half a second faster than Coulthard, but in one turn he lost some time, and he only improve with 1/10 of a second. Coulthard regained his pole position just seconds later. After Verstappen's accident red flags were waving and the session was stopped for a while. When it continued, history repeated itself: Schumi regained his second place, Barrichello his third. Later Schumi did a (sad to say) excellent job and took a temporarily pole position. Barrichello too improved and "stole" the second place from Coulthard, though temporarily also. In the very last minutes of the qualifying session Coulthard took the pole position back from Schumi with an amazingly small margin -0.007 sec, but had to give it back when Schumi beat his time with -0.098 sec. Barrichello had to settle with a third place, and Häkkinen with a fourth. McLaren fans, don't lose hope. Mika always drives at his best under pressure. We've seen it before. We'll see it again *crossing fingers*

Mika's comment after the qualifying session: "I had a trouble free qualifying session but seemed to lose time at the hairpin. To start the race from fourth is not ideal but its not too bad either. You don't score points in qualifying only in the race - we will wait and see what happens tomorrow".

The race:The start was a bit of a mess 'cause when Mika Häkkinen passed Barrichello, Villeneuve pressed from the other side and forced Mika to back off. This gave Barrichello the opportunity to regain his position and Mika was then suddenly number 6. Coulthard received a stop/go-penalty a little later because of the mechanics not leaving the track early enough before the warm-up lap was starting, so this placed him on 10th place and we didn't see much more of him during the rest of the race. Then the frustrating part of today's race started, when Mika was stuck behind Barrichello, who was slowed down because of Villeneuve, so Schumacher naturally ran away from them. In lap 24 Coulthard spund off the track but managed to continue the race, only losing one place, and at this point Schumi was already 23 seconds in front of number two. In the following lap the first break-through happened when Barrichello took a huge risk and drove side by side with Villeneuve for some long, exciting seconds but didn't succeed at first. Another try just seconds later seemed to take Jacques Villeneuve by surprise and Barrichello left both him and Häkkinen behind very quickly. Häkkinen tried numerous times to pass as well but didn't succeed. Frentzen's first pit stop screwed up and he had to retire. Though Schumi had a major lead he still didn't make it back on the track in front of his Team mate after the first pit stop, which took 9.5 secs. FINALLY in lap 34 Villeneuve let Häkkinen pass, the take-over went beautifully, no risk, no fighting, and Mika drove like never before, immediately earning Fastest Lap of the race, catching up with the Ferrari cars with as much as two seconds per lap!!! Unfortunately when Mika was right in Schumi's red ass, he was called in to the pit, less than two laps before it started to rain. Back to the pit again to change tyres. The Ferrari drivers were called in at the same time, only God knows why, and Barrichello was forced to wait inexpensable seconds for Schumi's tyres to get changed, and obviously the Pit Stop Team wasn't ready for Rubens, 'cause it took 21 seconds to find his tyres before putting them on. One of the only drivers with an excellent strategy was Fisichella, who didn't go in for his first pit stop before the rain set in, which saved him for that second stop, which also gave him a podium finish, though Mika (despite of his two stops) was breathing down Fisichella's neck in the end of the race. Schumi is known for being an excellent driver in wet conditions and he also managed to increase his unbelievable lead with half a sec/lap, and didn't start to "relax" before he had 53 secs lead to Häkkinen. Mika seemed to play it safe for a long while but when there was only 10 laps to go, he started to speed up and take some risk, catching Fisichella, again with 2 seconds per lap. In the end Schumi too played it (very very) safe, losing 2-3 secs/lap, and Barrichello almost passed him in those final hundred meters before the finishing line, but Schumi took victory, Barrichello second place, Fisichella third and Mika Häkkinen fourth. David Coulthard tried to pass Wurz in the 2nd last lap, and of course he managed to smash into Wurz' side the True Coulthard-way, and yet he finished 7th... Mika Salo retired, and Eddie Irvine obviously liked the grass area more than the track itself, spending most of his time spinning around there :-)

Mika's comment after the race: "I was quick off the line at the start and managed to get alongside Barrichello coming into the first corner. However Villeneuve managed to get next to me so I decided to play it safe and ease off rather than ending up in the gravel trap. As a result both Barrichello and myself were stuck behind Villeneuve for a number of laps. Even so I believe if I had managed to overtake Villeneuve at the same time as Barrichello passed him I could have got past the Brazilian as well. I finally found a way passed Jacques and I was able to go flat out. Then it started to rain and my race was pretty much over".

Last year Mika lost the pole position by 29 thousandths of a second to his Team mate, Coulthard, but Mika still won the race. Safty car came on the track four times after Michael Schumacher, Zonta, Villeneuve and Frentzen crashed into the walls.