Mexico City GP: Max Verstappen tops tight Practice Two from Lando Norris with Lewis Hamilton seventh

Max Verstappen was the fastest driver in both practice sessions on Friday for Red Bull. Lando Norris finished second, while Lewis Hamilton struggled and finished seventh.

Max Verstappen was the fastest in both Friday practice sessions at the Mexico City Grand Prix. Lando Norris could be the strongest competitor for Verstappen in qualifying for pole position.

Max Verstappen, aiming for his 16th victory of the season, had a great start to the weekend by setting the fastest lap time of 1:18.686. His time was just over a tenth of a second faster than Lando Norris from McLaren.

Charles Leclerc finished third for Ferrari, while Sergio Perez, Verstappen’s team-mate at Red Bull, came in fourth, cheered on by the passionate crowd at his home race.

Either side of him, there were two unexpected achievements. Valtteri Bottas finished fourth for Alfa Romeo, while Daniel Ricciardo came in sixth for AlphaTauri.

Lewis Hamilton finished 11th in the first practice session. He hoped to challenge Red Bull, but he ended up being seventh.

His teammate George Russell finished 10th. He didn’t participate in the first practice session because teams used it for their young driver sessions.

While Mercedes may be disappointed by their lack of speed after their upgrades in Austin, the high altitude of Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez could lead to significant changes overnight that may affect the order of the teams.

“The car is night and day different compared to last week and yeah… I don’t really know what to say,” said a puzzled Hamilton. “You just never know what you’re going to get with this one. Some days she’s great and some day’s she’s not.

“It’s hard to extract the lap. I think there definitely is performance there, it’s just trying to extract it and it’s quite peaky this weekend maybe just with the aero map or whatever it may be.

“So we’re going to work on it overnight but it definitely wasn’t a fun day compared to P1 in Austin. We were a bit off but hopefully overnight we can find something and [on Saturday] maybe the car will be nicer to drive.”

Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz finished in 11th place.

Aston Martin had a difficult day at the race. Lance Stroll finished in 18th place and Fernando Alonso finished in 20th. Alonso had a spin off the track and struggled with a car that has not performed well recently. Earlier in the season, the car was seen as a strong competitor to Red Bull.

Mexico City GP Practice Two Timesheet

Driver	Team	Time
1. Max Verstappen	Red Bull	1:18.686
2. Lando Norris	McLaren	+0.119
3. Charles Leclerc	Ferrari	+0.266
4. Valtteri Bottas	Alfa Romeo	+0.269
5. Sergio Perez	Red Bull	+0.302
6. Daniel Ricciardo	AlphaTauri	+0.316
7. Lewis Hamilton	Mercedes	+0.338
8. Esteban Ocon	Alpine	+0.391
9. Oscar Piastri	McLaren	+0.477
10. George Russell	Mercedes	+0.541
11. Carlos Sainz	Ferrari	+0.571
12. Yuki Tsunoda	AlphaTauri	+0.604
13. Zhou Guanyu	Alfa Romeo	+0.729
14. Alex Albon	Williams	+0.760
15. Nico Hulkenberg	Haas	+0.849
16. Pierre Gasly	Alpine	+0.956
17. Logan Sargeant	Williams	+1.214
18. Lance Stroll	Aston Martin	+1.389
19. Kevin Magnussen	Haas	+1.426
20. Fernando Alonso	Aston Martin	+1.740