It was groundhog day in more ways than one for Lewis Hamilton, as he grabbed the fastest time of the day in practice for the Canadian Grand Prix.
Hamilton returned to the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve - where he won his first pole position and gained his maiden grand prix victory in 2007 - and repeated his impressive performances by posting a quickest lap of one minute 15.752seconds on his 42nd and final lap of the second free practice session.
The British driver even had time to drive around a groundhog, as one of the mainstays of the temporary track's home on an island in the middle of the St Lawrence River strayed on to the circuit.
Hamilton got his wildlife confused, at first thinking he had encountered a beaver - but he was relieved to have avoided bloodshed.
"I love the track - there's not a part that I don't like," he said.
"But there are a lot of beavers or, I don't know what they're called. They keep coming onto the track, and I'm a bit worried they're going to kill themselves - because at the end of the day you're travelling at 200miles per hour and they're standing there in the middle of the track. There's not much you can do.
"I saw one in the middle of the track and I had to go around it. I saw the crowd, and they were quite happy I missed it."
Fresh off his victory in Monaco two week ago, the current world championship leader had completed only eight laps during this morning's first practice session - claiming the sixth-fastest time in his McLaren Mercedes in 1:18.303, behind the session's quickest man, Ferrari's Felipe Massa (1:17.553).
Hamilton started the afternoon session moderately, and was lying fifth-fastest before his rousing finish - first clocking 1:15.766 to knock world champion Kimi Raikkonen off top spot and then improving on his final lap with the 1:15.752.
Raikkonen - second in the drivers' championship heading into Sunday's race - was relegated further by BMW Sauber's Robert Kubica, the Monaco runner-up who continued his good form with a fastest lap of 1:16.023 on a track that had dried out from the morning following overnight rain.
Raikonnen was last out of the pits and vied with team-mate Massa for much of the session, the Finn clocking a fastest 1:16.093 for what would be the third best time.
Hamilton's McLaren team-mate Heikki Kovalainen was fourth-fastest in 1:16.331, with Massa next (1:16.413) before he came to a stop out on the track with 20 minutes of the 90-minute session to go.
Nick Heidfeld rounded out the top six for BMW Sauber, with a time of 1:16.589.
It was a bad session for Renault, with Nelson Piquet Jr grinding to halt as he entered the pit lane and then Fernando Alonso spinning out at turn one and unable to get going again.
Timo Glock was another early finisher, brushing one of the walls and damaging the right wheels on his Toyota - forcing him to abandon the car at turn six.
Massa was the next to stop, his premature finish affecting the whole field as marshals struggled to steer his Ferrari through a gap in the safety barriers.
"My car seemed to suffer some sort of blackout," said Massa.
"Gradually all of the systems shut down, and I had to stop at the side of the track."
When the yellow flags finally came in Hamilton stepped up and turned in his quickest laps.
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