F1 at the Villeneuve circuit where braking is tough the way Gilles liked it

6/13/2023

With at least 300,000 spectators expected in the stands at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve – last year there were 338,000 – the Canadian GP is the most popular sports event in the whole country.

With at least 300,000 spectators expected in the stands at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve – last year there were 338,000 – the Canadian GP is the most popular sports event in the whole country. The track is on Notre-Dame Island which was artificially made in 1965 on the Saint Lawrence River when the Montreal underground railway was being built.

According to the Brembo engineers, it is one of the most demanding circuits for brakes. On a scale of 1 to 5, it is rated 4 on the difficulty index. The braking points which are very sharp and close together subject the brake system to a lot of stress with the brake discs and pads reaching very high temperatures which are fortunately reduced by a number of long straight sections which give the components a rest and allow them to cool down.

Gilles and Brembo, advocates of driving pleasure 

Gilles Villeneuve continues to personify driving pleasure even today: whether he was riding a snowmobile or in the cockpit of a Formula 1 car, the Canadian was the epitome of happiness and resorted to any means not to stop, even if the car had a problem like when he completed a lap on only three wheels.

In all of the 6 GPs he won in Formula 1, Villeneuve always used Brembo brakes. Driving pleasure is one of the key elements of Brembo’s philosophy and applies to those who drive on the track and those who take on mountain roads: in both cases, the brake system must be responsive, combining safety with driver satisfaction.

140 kg (308 lb) of force, 6 times per lap

Formula 1 drivers use their brakes on half of the turns at the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve, yet they need them on all of the first 3, even though on the second one, the stopping distance is just 41 meters (134.5 feet) and the g-force 2.5. The brake system is used by drivers for 12 seconds per lap, the equivalent of 16% of the entire Grand Prix.

From the starting line to the checkered flag, each driver exerts a total load of over 67 metric tons on the brake pedal. On 5 turns, the load exceeds 145 kg (320 lb) and on another, exceeds 140 kg (308 lb). Despite this, the stopping distances are shorter and exceed 100 meters (328 feet) only in one section.

Less than 216 km/h (134.2 mph) in 2.5 seconds

Of the 7 braking sections at the Canadian GP, 6 are classified as very demanding on the brakes and the remaining one is light.

The hardest one is on turn 10 because it is the only one where the drivers reduce their speed by over 200 km/h (124.2 mph), 216 km/h (134.2 mph) to be precise.

They go from 290 km/h (180 mph) to 74 km/h (46 mph) in 2.55 seconds while covering a distance of 100 meters (328 feet) with a load of 146 kg (322 lb) applied to the brake pedal.

And what about the video games? 

In Canada since there are no exit lanes on most of the corners, every mistake you make comes at a price and the same applies to the video games.

To do the braking on the tenth turn in the best possible way, watch out for the tower on the right side with the big screen because the 100 m sign is hard to spot. Brake hard before you go past it and move into 2nd gear trying to hit the apex where the curb starts without going up onto it. Then the track widens - bear in mind that as you come out of the turn, the track veers to the right.