THE CANADIAN GP IN 5 KEY MOMENTS

1 Verstappen produces the drive of a champion

This was Max Verstappen’s most impressive display since Imola. Outqualified by Sergio Pérez in Monaco and Baku and seemingly out of sync with Red Bull’s RB18 – compromised particularly by its understeer tendencies – Verstappen was back to his best in Montréal.

Give him a wet track and a car with which he feels comfortable and there are few, if any, who can match him. In Canada, Verstappen was imperious in leading each segment of qualifying on a gradually drying circuit – while Pérez was nowhere and ultimately crashed out in Q2.

Carlos Sainz (always strong in the wet himself), George Russell, and particularly Fernando Alonso, all variously snapped at Verstappen’s heels – but even though chief rival Charles Leclerc was played out of the picture by a limit-busting Ferrari engine change, you got the feeling this was a Saturday where no one would touch Max, even under normal circumstances.

Traffic inevitably played its part in Q1, where Alonso was only 0.058 seconds away from Verstappen, but with fewer cars on track and intermediates fitted for Q2 and Q3, Verstappen