Hamilton raises hopes ahead of qualifying

Lewis Hamilton blew away McLaren's overnight fears to offer genuine hope of ending Red Bull Racing's domination of qualifying.

The majority of the drivers slated the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in the wake of yesterday's two 90-minute practice sessions, especially as it was destroying the softer-compound tyres.

Jenson Button described it as "scary"; Hamilton said it was "like an ice rink," whilst Robert Kubica claimed it to be the worst he had driven in Formula One.

Button and Hamilton both insisted the team would get to grips with the problems overnight, and certainly for the latter whatever the issues of yesterday, they appear to have been alleviated.

The 2008 world champion was comfortably quickest in the final hour-long practice session ahead of today's qualifying session for the Canadian Grand Prix, although he brushed a wall late on without penalty given his speed.

Hamilton clocked a time of one minute 16.058secs, finishing over a quarter of a second quicker than Red Bull's Mark Webber, and eight tenths of a second up on Sebastian Vettel's best time yesterday.

Unusually for F1 this season, four different teams occupied the top four places, with Ferrari's Fernando Alonso third and the Mercedes of Michael Schumacher fourth, both just under half a second down.

Vettel was fifth, followed by Renault's Robert Kubica, who was again bitterly complaining about failing to get his tyres to work, with Force India's Adrian Sutil seventh.

Although reigning champion Button was much quicker than yesterday, he could only manage eighth, 0.641secs adrift of Hamilton.

Force India's Vitantonio Liuzzi and the second Renault of Vitaly Petrov completed the top 10, followed by Williams' Nico Hulkenberg and Felipe Massa in his Ferrari.

The Brazilian was involved in one of the minor incidents of the session, clipping a concrete wall at speed, sending sparks flying off the rim of his front-left wheel.

Nico Rosberg only managed four laps in his Mercedes due to a clutch sensor issue, whilst Virgin's Lucas di Grassi also hit a wall and ended up in a gravel trap in the dying seconds.

Karun Chandhok finished at the bottom of the standings without a time to his name as he suffered a hydraulic issue with his Hispania Racing that saw him complete just one installation lap.