Verstappen just gets better and better and better...

Verstappen was perfect, untouchable in the great leveller of wet tricky conditions (which separates the men from the boys as they say) and caught out many in the Montreal rain on Saturday, including his Red Bull Racing teammate Sergio Perez whose best effort on a treacherous Saturday in Montreal was only good for 12th on the timing screens, before Oscar Piastri's prang in the McLaren brought proceedings to a halt in Q3.

But no one was going to go quicker, as the rain intensified no one bothered to have a final fling. What Max delivered was a truly beautiful lap (watch it again) in which he scraped the edge of everything, that could be scraped, to perfection and would not be beaten. In the end, he was a whopping 1.244s faster than the rest. Piastri's mishap gave everyone the chance to throw in the towel.

Verstappen had done the business, comfortably faster than his rivals, at times around 1.5s faster than the fastest chaser and, at one point, two seconds up on his teammate in the sister Red Bull RB19; the dismantling of Perez in the last three race weekends is unprecedented.

Indeed, the Mexican did beat Verstappen in Jeddah and Baku with all he has. But those defeats clearly irked the 25-year-old World Champ who emerged in Monaco better than ever; even better in Spain and now again up a notch in Canada, where yesterday he delivered among the best driving we have ever seen in a wet Qualy.

Oozing confidence after claiming his 25th F1 career pole position start, Verstappen summed up his Qualy session: “Q1 was quite straightforward with inters. The track was quite dry in some places, so there was not many things that could catch you out because the tyres were getting up to temperature quite quickly. That was good.

“After that of course you had to make the call in Q2, when to switch to slick tyres. I opted to initially go out on the inters just to get a lap in because they work a bit better of course than cold slick tyres on a damp track.

“But then it was quite clear I needed to go on the slicks, and we did a pit stop. Those slick tyres those first two laps, out lap and first timed, it’s quite tricky knowing the grip levels, and knowing how hard to push. Luckily, we got a decent lap in at the end, which was enough to go to Q3. After that, it started to slowly increase, the rain, and then at one point, it was not possible to start on the slicks.

“Overall, we just had good communication with the team, throughout Q1 and Q2, which I think is the most important and we were clear with what we wanted to do. And in Q3 it kept on raining, and it was very important to be out there quickly and get the laps in.

“Of course, I had to wait a long time at the end of the pit lane, tyres are cold, but it does give me clean air and good vision, which I guess also helps to put a lap in… we just made all the right calls, had the right at the track to do the lap times and very happy to be on pole here.”

Verstappen is on course to win a sixth Grand Prix this season and is the outright favourite to do so in Montreal today, the RB19 in his hands has been mighty everywhere and he expects it to be strong in the race.

"The long runs looked alright, we were quite happy with that," reckoned Max. "But there are always of course things you want to look at and improve and that’s what we did. Maybe the one-lap pace wasn’t fantastic but that’s not something to worry about in the race

As for his challengers, Verstappen replied: "Difficult to know. Fernando [Alonso] had a very good long run. The Ferraris were quite strong in the dry, including also Mercedes so it’s a bit difficult to say at the moment.”

The Dutchman who is powering to his third F1 Title in a row, will be looking to take a step closer to that hat-trick in Canada today, on the occasion of his 171st GP start, and aiming to claim Red Bull's 100th victory in the top flight and his sixth of this season.

So why even watch when we almost know the result: VER P1? Because Verstappen is operating on a legendary level of excellence, of the type enjoyed by the likes of Ayrton Senna, Alain Prost, Michael Schumacher, Sebastian Vettel, Fernando Alonso and Lewis Hamilton - all greats of the modern F1 era - Max sitting in among them.

Every Verstappen race is a potential "I was there" or "I saw that" event, like that drive from tenth to victory in Hungary, the 15th to the top step of the podium at Spa-Franorchamps last year. This year the transformation was like a switch, turning it on to instantly up the ante as he did in Monaco and Spain, and again yesterday in the Montreal rain - another epic F1 moment.

So to keep abreast of rare greatness, stay tuned to witness the Max Verstappen Show as he just gets better and better and better with every session!