F1 2016: six things you need to know about the Canadian GP

A fortnight on from the pit-stop error that cost him victory at the Monaco Grand Prix, Daniel Ricciardo appears to have overcome the immense disappointment in time to focus on this weekend’s race in Montreal.

“I definitely felt after the race that I wasn’t in a place, probably no one was in a place to try to resolve what happened,” said the Red Bull driver. “I let it cool a couple of days and then I spoke to Christian [Horner], I spoke to my engineer.”

The Australian had an opportunity to reclaim the race lead from Lewis Hamilton during the final set of stops, but a delay in retrieving tyres from the back of the garage left him behind the world champion with little prospect of overtaking.

Ricciardo confirmed that Red Bull have upgraded their pit-wall software to ensure that the “mistake” doesn’t happen again. What he would give for a repeat of his 2014 Canada GP win this Sunday...

We’ve long been of the view that F1 drivers shouldn’t be forced to act for commercial partners (see these examples from McLaren, Ferrari and Renault), and once again we’ve been proven right.

This week it’s Lewis Hamilton who has been obliged to perform for the cameras, playing an elderly version of himself for financial services company Allianz.

Set in ‘Lewis Hamilton’s Estate’ in 2066, the advert features the driver telling his grandchildren about his “cautious” driving style and risk-free approach to racing.

“That’s stupid!” exclaims one of the young actors at the end of the ad. There’s no fooling children...

Ferrari are under pressure, not least because of their failure to consistently challenge Mercedes in the opening stages of the season. Rather than pushing the Mercs for race wins – as many thought would be the case after winter testing – the Italian outfit has struggled with reliability problems and plenty of misfortune.

Defending the team’s results so far in 2016, Kimi Raikkonen said that the team was “working better together” than they had been last year.

“What is probably underestimated is that the races got mixed up from last season,” he continued. “The races we’ve been usually strong have been moved to a later point in the season and those where we have expected to have more of a hard time have been moved to the beginning of the year.”

Meanwhile, rumours have emerged suggesting that the Finn could lose his seat in 2017, with Nico Rosberg in the frame to replace the 2007 champion at Ferrari. “I am not interested in commenting on any crude stories,” responded the 36-year-old. “That is basically nonsense that the media make up.”

You tell ‘em, Kimi.

Pastor Maldonado was unceremoniously dropped from Renault earlier in the year after his sponsors failed deliver payments on time, but the Venezuelan hasn’t given up hope of driving in F1 again.

“It's difficult being a winning driver here to go to suffer in other series,” he told Autosport, having indeed won a grand prix in Spain in 2012. “I have a good chance to come back but as a professional, we need to have a plan B.”

Lately Maldonado has been helping Pirelli develop its F1 tyres for 2017, although he has been using the time assess his options as well.

“WEC is very interesting and there is DTM which is interesting,” he observed. “There is IndyCar, which is a single-seater car and more my style. So these three series plus Formula E are possibilities. We'll see.”

Perhaps Maldonado Bingo hasn’t been consigned to history just yet...

Ever the optimist, Fernando Alonso is hoping that he will be able to fight for the championship next year despite there being no apparent end in sight to McLaren-Honda’s lack of performance.

The team are slowly beginning to feature more regularly in the top ten, but are still some way off challenging the frontrunners for podiums and wins.

“I think it's not that unlikely that we will fight for the championship next year,” Alonso told Motorsport.com, adding that 2017’s rule changes could propel the team up the grid.

“So I think things are quite open for next year. I'm not that pessimistic, I'm not thinking right now that we will not be in that fight. Who knows? Everything is possible, everything is open.”

The Spaniard also said that he would decide next summer whether or not to stay in the sport beyond 2017, based on the effects of the new regulations and the performance of his car.

The beer brand has announced a multi-year deal with the sport, which will see it become the title sponsor of three grands prix per season whilst adopting the slogan ‘If you drink, don’t drive’ as part of its campaign.

The news has gained a lot of attention in the media because of the company’s track record in digital media with other sports, such as football and rugby.

Bernie Ecclestone, who has previously been sceptical of using the internet to promote F1, has said that Heineken will “wake me up a bit with the social media”.

With F1’s presence declining on free-to-view TV channels, it certainly needs to build its audience somehow. Is this the answer?