Oscar Piastri defies Montreal 'misery' to qualify third for Canadian Grand Prix, Lando Norris only seventh

Oscar Piastri declared he's still "pretty happy" with third on the grid for the Canadian Grand Prix as McLaren endures its toughest weekend of the year in Montreal.

Having dominated much of the season, the papaya cars comparatively struggled through practice. A "miserable" Piastri was well down the timesheets and even hit the wall in final practice.

Norris was fairing only marginally better. He topped that final practice session, but struggled in qualifying and will start Monday morning's (AEST) race from seventh.

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"After all the practice sessions, I was struggling. I didn't have a smooth session, (but) everything just felt more back to normal (in qualifying)," Piastri said.

"In qualifying, everything came alive again ... practice was pretty miserable."

"I just wanted to have a clean run through qualifying, not introduce any variables that could have made things even more difficult. That's what we stuck to.

"I think it's been a strength of ours so far this year – sticking to our guns and doing what we think is best for us."

George Russell took a shock pole from Max Verstappen and Piastri, who has a 10-point lead over Norris in the drivers' standings. Verstappen is third, 49 points behind Piastri.

The Aussie said despite practice struggles and his third place on the grid, he had no concerns about McLaren's race pace or his chances of another victory on Monday.

"It's a track where (Mercedes and Red Bull) have been strong in the past. The conditions maybe suited them more," he said.

"... In qualifying, I think it's just the kind of normal battle. That's a bit of the price you pay for not being on top of things from the start. You miss that extra half a tenth maybe, and that can be the difference. That's more or less what it was today.

"I think we are in the mix but paid the price for a slightly messy weekend."

Kimi Antonelli, Russell's teammate at Mercedes, qualified fourth and was followed by Lewis Hamilton of Ferrari and Fernando Alonso in his best qualifying effort of the season for Aston Martin.

After Norris in seventh was Charles Leclerc of Ferrari, Isack Hadjar of Racing Bulls, and Alex Albon of Williams.

Albon was involved in a bizarre incident in the first qualifying group when his engine cover inexplicably blew off his Williams and littered the track with debris. It brought out a red flag but didn't prevent him from advancing to the next round.

His teammate, Carlos Sainz Jr., wasn't as fortunate and was eliminated in the first round after he was heavily baulked by the Racing Bulls of Isack Hadjar.

Yuki Tsunoda, meanwhile, qualified 11th but received a 10-place grid infraction and two penalty points for passing Piastri under the red flag in final practice earlier in the day.

The race will start at 4am (AEST) Monday.

- With AP