Race weekend review
The main news of the week was the FIA’s announcement on Red Bull’s cost cap breach; they were fined seven million dollars and got a 10% reduction in wind tunnel time. Their breach was 2.2 million dollars but if a tax credit had been applied correctly it would have been 0.5 million dollars. Aston Martin received a four hundred and fifty thousand dollar fine for their breach of the cost cap.
Several drivers sported new helmets for the Mexican Grand Prix. Sebastian Vettel wore one of his iconic Red Bull helmets with the words “Danke Didi” as a tribute to the late Dietrich Mateschitz.
Practice
Many young drivers replaced the usual F1 drivers in FP1 in Mexico. Liam Lawson, Logan Sargeant, Nyck De Vries, Jack Doohan and Pietro Fittipaldi all had the opportunities to impress. Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc topped the charts for Ferrari but the top six were covered by just under two tenths, so there was no obvious advantage yet.
Testing on the Pirelli rubber in FP2 saw an unusual top 3 of Russell, Tsunoda and Ocon. Red flags were waved when Charles Leclerc went off the track and hit the barriers, damaging his rear wing. Magnussen and Stroll were to take grid penalties for the race; the Dane needed an engine replacement earning him 5 places, and Stroll 3 for his incident with Alonso at the U.S. GP.
Russell topped the charts again on Saturday morning, but this time he was joined by his team mate Lewis Hamilton and gave Mercedes the 1-2, the 8x world champions looking threatening at the top. Verstappen completed the top 3 but was almost half a second behind Russell’s leading time.
Qualifying
The usual suspects, our regular top six were safe; the Ferraris and Red Bulls chose not to do a final run unlike the others who needed extra laps to see them through. Schumacher and Vettel set the exact same lap time, the Haas driver putting his time in first. But it would not be enough for the Germans to escape elimination. Out in Q1: Schumacher, Vettel, Stroll, Albon, Latifi.
The top four of Hamilton, Sainz, Russell and Verstappen were all close in time. Perez took to a clear track with just three minutes to spare, setting himself a time that would see him fifth. Unfortunately for Ricciardo, the McLaren driver missed out on Q3 to Alonso by 0.053s. Out in Q2: Ricciardo, Zhou, Tsunoda, Gasly, Magnussen.
An intense fight for pole position was looming. Three teams seemed to be in with a chance. The top 5 after first runs were: Verstappen, Russell, Perez, Sainz and Bottas. Hamilton’s time (his first run) that was good enough for P3 was deleted for track limits. Verstappen improved on his final lap, solidifying the pole position, while Russell did not improve (due to track limits) but kept his P2 ahead of Hamilton who was P3 by just 0.005s. It was not very common for the pole sitter to take the victory at the Mexico GP in recent years, while good fortune had been on the side of the third place starter on the grid; would things be different this year?
Top 10: Verstappen, Russell, Hamilton, Perez, Sainz, Bottas, Leclerc, Norris, Alonso, Ocon.
Race Report
Max Verstappen broke yet another record at the Mexico GP. Taking his Red Bull to victory, the Dutchman finished 15 seconds ahead of next second place finisher Lewis Hamilton. A one stop strategy, from soft to medium tyres which were well taken care of, saw Verstappen take his 14th win of the season. He now holds the record of most wins in an F1 season, overtaking a record he equalled with Schumacher and Vettel just last week. Perez had the same strategy as Verstappen, he was closing in on Hamilton after his pitstop but was unable to catch the Brit in the end so he settled for third.
Mercedes strategy ultimately let them down in Mexico. In what could have been a more successful weekend with the pace they had seen during free practice and qualifying, the Silver Arrows were not as close as they would have liked. Hamilton overtook Russell at the start and held onto track position, but the medium-hard strategy did not work in their favour as they could not find the pace needed to catch those in front of them. Hamilton grabbed a podium for the team, taking a valuable P2, and Russell took P4 quite a bit further back.
It was an uneventful weekend for Ferrari who finished P5 and P6. They lacked the pace of their competitors and were miles behind, so far behind that Russell was able to pit for new tyres to set the fastest lap of the race and still come out comfortably ahead of Sainz in fifth.
McLaren had a good race; both drivers scoring points for the papaya team. Ricciardo received a 10 second time penalty for causing a collision with Tsunoda, but this riled up the Aussie who stormed his way to P7, overtaking both Ocon and Alonso and forming a large enough gap to the Frenchman who was P8. He was also voted driver of the day. Norris had a solid drive to get P9.
Alpine lost out to McLaren points-wise at the Mexico GP but still maintain a seven point lead to their rivals. Ocon found himself in a McLaren sandwich in P8, while Alonso had a late retirement due to an engine issue- the Spaniard called out Alpine and its reliability issues.
Quite a dismal day for Aston Martin who could only manage 14th and 15th, they too, lacked the pace to compete. Vettel completed an impressive stint on his soft tyres which he started the race on, but on medium tyres after a pitstop, the car just was not quite right. Stroll was on a different strategy but no such luck was found for either driver.
AlphaTauri would be glad to see the back of that race as they left Mexico with no points. Gasly just missed out in P11, he picked up a five second time penalty for forcing Stroll off the track. Tsunoda was the other non-finisher after his contact with Ricciardo saw him limp to the pits and retire from the race.
Alfa Romeo managed to come away with one point, Valtteri Bottas hung on for P10 to get that all important championship point that will be crucial in their battle with Aston Martin who they are now four points ahead of.
No points for Williams, with Albon their highest finisher in P12 who was in the hunt for P10 in the closing stages but was overtaken by an eager Gasly. Latfi was the last of the finishers, a lap behind the second-last place finisher Magnussen.
We have a week’s break before we get back to racing. Next we will see the drivers take on the Brazil GP where there will be a sprint race, meaning extra points are up for grabs.
Keep an eye on our social media for news, games and more!
About The Author
Leave a Reply