Verstappen heads the field in Montreal

Max Verstappen responded in style to his critics at Friday practice for the Canadian Grand Prix by topping the timesheets in both sessions. Verstappen has vowed to do his talking on the track after his miserable Monaco weekend, and made good of Renault's upgraded power unit.

COMEBACK KID

Verstappen began the race weekend threatening to "headbutt" anyone who asked him about his crashes in 2018.

If he continues like this, those questions will be a thing of the past.

He went quickest in a session for the first time in 2018 in FP1 and repeated the trick in FP2, stopping the watch at one minute 12.198 seconds, just seven tenths of a second off the track record set by Lewis Hamilton in last year's qualifying.

In a mirror image of Monaco, Daniel Ricciardo was the Red Bull struggling, his team working hard to fix a power unit issue without needing to change parts which would trigger a grid penalty.

Ricciardo only managed to run with anger in the last 25 minutes of FP2, but placed third quickest, four tenths off Verstappen.

MERCEDES' MUCK-UP

Both Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas swerved the fastest hypersoft tyres, to avoid running out of them!

All other teams have brought either seven or eight sets per driver of the pink-walled tyres, but Hamilton and Bottas only have five each.

As such, their fastest times were set on ultrasoft tyres, although Hamilton's placing in the top four, nearly within half a second of Verstappen suggests the Silver Arrows' pace remains strong.

Both cars are running engines with six races' worth of mileage in them, but they remained strong in the final sector, home of the longest straight to hint that their power remains intact.

LOOK OUT FOR ALONSO

On his 300th grand prix entry, could Fernando Alonso spring a surprise?

On net pace, the McLaren man looks a clear seventh-best behind the big three.

Although he was 10th in the FP2 timesheet, his 1:13.866 was set on ultrasoft tyres, with the three drivers ahead of him all on the softest compound, but Romain Grosjean was only two tenths quicker. Bolting on the hypers is expected to yield an extra seven tenths.