Valtteri Bottas lead a Mercedes one-two after going a tenth faster than his teammate Lewis Hamilton in the first practice session for the Mexico City Grand Prix. The Finn set an 18.3 going fastest in the Mexican capital as Mercedes look to claw back points to Red Bull in both the drivers and constructors championship.
Many predicted a close battle this weekend between the top two, Red Bull’s Max Verstappen was third fastest only a tenth behind Bottas. The Dutchman was over a tenth faster than his teammate Sergio Perez, who goes into this weekend with the best chance of a home win.
Hamilton and Verstappen are separated by twelve points with five races to go, this weekend on paper being a Red Bull track. However Red Bull beat Mercedes in Austin, which was seen as favouring Mercedes with plenty of pecking order intrigue for this weekend at a circuit that is typically more suited to Red Bull.
Red Bull has won the last two races in Mexico City, but it wasn’t a perfect start for Perez who broke his rear wing when he went into the wall a Peraltada early in the session. Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc made the same mistake early on, with the Monacan finishing down in eighth.
Leclerc lose the rear of his SF21 when he touched the outside kerb at the start of the Peraltada corner and it swung around to the right, which meant he slid off backwards and low speed and hit the barriers, breaking his rear wing endplates.
Hamilton and Alfa Romeo’s Kimi Raikkonen are to be investigated by stewards after the session for failing to rejoin the track according to the rules after going off at the first corner. He is unlikely to receive a penalty for a minor infringement in a practice session.
Perez had higher speed off after he too turned in from on the kerbs, but as he caught his oversteer snap his RB16B snapped and second time, left, and he spun around rapidly, ripping his rear wing half off in the car.
The circuit proved to be quite dusty, it has not been used since 2019 and has been used since the start of the pandemic as a Covid-19 hospital and medical centre. Although the dust soon cleared up with the drivers complaining about visibility, many teams decided to spilt their tyre strategy.
Alpha Tauri’s Pierre Gasly was fifth fastest six tenths off the pace, the Frenchman had been the first driver to set a time on softs thus going fastest early on. Hamilton then went faster but his time was deleted when he went too deep at Turn Two and failed to remain left of the bollard.
Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz was a second off the pace with his teammate Charles Leclerc eighth, a tenth behind. They were separated by the Alpine of Fernando Alonso, the Spaniard a hundredth ahead of Sainz, the second Alpine of Esteban Ocon going ninth with the Aston Martin’s Sebastian Vettel rounding out the top ten.
Ferrari’s main rivals McLaren appeared to struggle with traffic and find pace, Daniel Ricciardo going fourteenth eighth tenths behind Sainz. His teammate Lando Norris was four-hundredths behind, the duo both struggling with traffic and that meant they couldn’t get rhythm.
Yuki Tsunoda put his Alpha Tauri eleventh going a hundredth fastest than Kimi Raikkonen, with Lance Stroll four-tenths behind the Finn. Tsunoda and Stroll will both start at the back of the grid for exceeding their allocation of engine parts.
Behind Norris was Antonio Giovinazzi, the Alfa Romeo driver going over a tenth and a half ahead of George Russell’s Williams. The Englishman was over a second faster than his teammate Nicolas Latifi, with the two Haas’s rounding out the field. Mick Schumacher going over half a second faster than teammate Nikita Mazepin.
