Alonso bookies favourite for Montreal

Fernando Alonso is the bookies favourite to secure victory at the Canadian Grand Prix this week despite wide expectation that the Ferraris of Felipe Massa and Kimi Raikkonen will have a performance advantage over the Spaniard at the Montreal circuit.

Alonso, who won the race last year and is currently leading the world championship, has been tightly priced with odds of no longer than 9/4 by UK's top bookmakers.

The Mclaren driver is closely followed in the market by Felipe Massa and Kimi Raikkonen at 11/4 and 7/2 respectively. Britain's Lewis Hamilton, who co-leads the world championship on points but lies in second place by virtue of not having won yet, can be found at 4/1 by SportingOdds.com. Continued...

A quick glance at the betting market before the influence of practice and qualifying and there's not a great deal to catch the eye. I fancy one of the BMW's for a podium finish.

The car should go well at a track that requires good top speed and engine power. All it takes is two of the top four to retire with reliability problems or to be involved in an incident and Heidfeld or Kubica - generously priced at 8/1 (William Hill) and 12/1 (Paddy Power) for a podium - could be there to pick up the pieces.

And how about one of the Torro Rosso's at 12/1 (BetDirect.net) for a points finish? The car looked pretty handy around the streets of Monaco a fortnight ago with Antonio Luizzi looking impressive in qualifying and Scott Speed only narrowly missing out on 8th place in the race.

Source: BettingZone.OddsChecker.com