McLaren made the boldest tyre call on the Canadian Grand Prix grid, and it came back to bite the team. Alone among the front-runners, it sent both cars off on intermediate tyres, a choice it would soon concede was the wrong one.
The drizzle that prompted the gamble had largely cleared, and the body language of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri told the story before the lights even went out, their doubts plain to see on the formation laps.
McLaren did not hide from the error afterwards, though it insisted the decision was reasonable on the information it had at the time. With moisture still around, the team feared that bringing slick tyres up to temperature on the untested 2026 cars in damp conditions could have backfired badly.
One factor counted against it. The delay of roughly six minutes, caused by the recovery of Arvid Lindblad's stranded car, dried the circuit and tilted the balance firmly towards slicks. Had the race started on schedule, McLaren suggested, the outcome might have looked very different.
Rivals were unconvinced. Several made clear they had known, the instant the tyre blankets came off, that McLaren had blundered.
Norris, who only began to find his groove late on in a compromised afternoon, was philosophical about a punt that did not pay off.
"That was the first time in the weekend that things just started to feel more comfortable," Norris said. "What we did was a bit extreme, and it worked out quite well." He could not hide his regret at the bigger picture, adding: "Points were definitely possible today."
Piastri's day ended more dramatically still, his McLaren sliding into Williams' Alex Albon in an incident he later apologised for, leaving the team empty-handed. Norris was quick to defend his team-mate.
"With Oscar, just unfortunate," Norris said. "I don't think he planned to do the overtake. He just got caught up with the track conditions."
For a squad more often criticised for playing it safe, this was the opposite problem. McLaren backed itself, broke from the field and was made to pay, a reminder of how fine the line is between an inspired call and an expensive one. In Monaco, where overtaking is scarce and grid position is gold, the team can ill afford a repeat.
