Lando Norris claimed a commanding victory at the Mexico City Grand Prix, taking over the world championship lead by one point from McLaren teammate Oscar Piastri with four races remaining in the season.
Norris, whose first win since the Hungarian Grand Prix in July knocked Piastri off the top of the rankings for the first time since April, capped off a great weekend at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodríguez, beating Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc by a whopping 30 seconds.
Leclerc held onto second place from Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, whose third place meant he had once again closed the gap on the championship leader, with the reigning champion still trailing by 36 points.
Piastri struggled all weekend under the influence of Norris, finishing fifth from seventh on the grid. His race belatedly came to life after McLaren gambled on a second pit stop and everyone but Norris, Leclerc and Verstappen made similar pit stops, but a fourth place that would have meant he maintained a one point lead was denied by Haas’s impressive Oliver Bearman.
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McLaren driver Lando Norris was booed by the crowd when he spoke about his victory at the Mexico City Grand Prix.
Adding to the confusion on the opening lap as many drivers ran off the track in an attempt to move up from ninth on the grid, Bearman ran third after his first stop, but dropped back when Haas made his second stop. However, fourth place still represents a brilliant result for the 20-year-old Briton, his best result of his rookie season and the best of the team’s 10 seasons in F1.
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George Russell expressed his frustration on the radio after demanding a place swap with Mercedes teammate Kimi Antonelli at the Mexico City Grand Prix.
Mercedes duo Kimi Antonelli and George Russell finished sixth and seventh after swapping positions twice on track in an ultimately anxious battle for a better result for the team.
Russell had become increasingly agitated on his team radio ahead of his first substitution, seeing that Mercedes had fallen behind in letting him pass first, but ultimately kept his promise to bring Antonelli back in front if he could not recover once more, which he did not do.
And Lewis Hamilton, still waiting for his first career podium with Ferrari after finishing eighth in the race, was handed a 10-second penalty by the stewards.
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Lewis Hamilton was given a 10-second time penalty for leaving the track to gain an advantage after a wheel-to-wheel collision with Max Verstappen.
Hamilton held third on the grid for the opening stint, but was handed a hefty sanction after he gained an advantage by going off the track in Turn 4 on lap six in a battle with Verstappen. His rivals for the old title had already crashed tires at the start of the same lap, but no further action was taken on this incident.
Haas’s Esteban Ocon rounded out a successful day with ninth place in the second car, while Sauber’s Gabriel Bortleto took the final points. Haas overtook Sauber to take 8th place in the constructors’ championship, moving them within 10 points of Racing Bulls in 6th place and within 7 points of Aston Martin in 7th place.
More to come…
F1’s thrilling title race continues in Brazil with a sprint weekend at the São Paulo Grand Prix from November 7th to 9th, broadcast live on Sky Sports F1. Stream Sky Sports now – cancel anytime with no contract
