It was the tenth round of the 2001 CART season, the 16th annual edition of the Molson Indy Toronto, and the first of two events that were held in Canada.

Gil de Ferran won the pole position and maintained his lead throughout the race's first half.

Hélio Castroneves took over the lead after de Ferran made a pit stop for fuel and held it for 15 laps before he retired with a mechanical issue.

The result advanced Andretti to second in the Drivers' Championship, ten points behind leader Kenny Bräck, while Castroneves fell to third place, with eleven races left in the season.

[6] Franchitti was considered one of the favorites to win the race having won the event two years previously and hoped to keep a recent string of good results in the 2001 season going at the track.

Bräck expected to perform well despite retiring from the previous year's event and hoped he could regain the momentum he built from the start of the season.

The race's defending champion Michael Andretti had secured six of his 40 career victories in Toronto and stated that he did not know if luck played a part but noted his driving style was suited to the circuit.

Tony Kanaan, Jimmy Vasser, Tagliani, Christian Fittipaldi, Da Matta, Patrick Carpentier, Franchitti and Paul Tracy were in third to tenth places.

[12] Shinji Nakano lapped fastest in the final practice session with a time of 58.133 seconds; Kanaan, Junqueira, De Ferran, Andretti, da Matta.

The session was stopped four times: firstly for Vasser who stalled on the circuit; the second for Kanaan because his engine failed heading towards the start-finish line, the third was for Bräck who slid and hit the turn eight outside tyre wall with his left front wheel and his suspension was broken.

He was joined on the grid's front row by teammate Castroneves who had the pole position until de Ferran's lap.

Bräck qualified third, Kanaan fourth and Tagliani fifth (all three drivers went onto the track's run-off areas but continued without damage to their cars.

[15][17] Vasser, da Matta, Michel Jourdain Jr., Gugelmin, Junqueira, Papis and Tora Takagi filled the next seven places on the grid.

[19] Fernández locked his brakes and struck the turn five tire wall, stopping the session for three minutes to allow course officials to remove his car from the barrier.

The first caution of the race was prompted on the second lap when Andretti stalled and safety officials had to restart his car.

[22] Andretti chose to make a pit stop for fuel following a decision made by his team manager Kim Green.

Dixon spun to avoid hitting Moreno while da Matta and Vasser both stopped and made light contact with the front-ends of their cars.

[22] The third caution was given on lap ten; Tracy glanced the rear-right wheel of Servià's car heading into turn three which caused both drivers to spin and stall.

The sixth caution was shown on the 49th lap when Takagi hit the right-rear wheel of Moreno's car in the turn three right-hand corner.

Carpentier broke his rear wing after he collided with the turn one tire barrier when he locked his brakes and retired after it was discovered that his gearbox had sustained damage.

[22][24] Castroneves made a scheduled pit stop on lap 65, handing the lead to Fernández, and rejoined in tenth place.

[22] Gidley lost control of the rear-end of his car exiting turn 11 while accelerating and hit the outside wall which broke his right-front suspension on the same lap.

The ninth period of yellow flags were shown on lap 73 to allow track officials to recover Gidley's damaged car.

[22] Tagliani ran in sixth gear after his team ordered him to conserve fuel and was unable to generate enough heat into his tires to challenge Andretti on the restarts.

Andretti's lead of 7.4 seconds was reduced to nothing when the eleventh (and final) caution was displayed on the next lap to allow course officials to extract Fittipaldi's and Junquiera's cars from the track.

[20] Tagliani, who finished in second place, stated it was a "good day" for his team and hoped he could continue his recent successes.

[28] Third-place finisher Fernández said it was a "great day" for himself and his team but was disappointed as he felt he could have won the race because of a problem at his final pit stop.

[20] Zanardi was pleased with his fourth-place finish, saying it was more fun than at the previous round (the Grand Prix of Cleveland) and felt his engineers were helping him to build a competitive car despite his poor qualifying performances.

"[25] Three days after the race, Tracy and Takagi was penalized by CART chief steward Chris Kneifel for "unjustifiable risk" and for causing several caution periods by contact with other competitors.

[30]The result meant Bräck remained the leader in the Drivers' Championship with 83 points, while Andretti's victory advanced him to second place.