#MexicoGP FP1: @Max33Verstappen tops time-sheets ahead of @alex_albon. #F1 #MexicanGP

Verstappen Mexico GP FP1 – Newly-crowned three-time world champion Max Verstappen was quickest in FP1 at the Mexico GP and narrowly ahead of Williams Racing’s Alexander Albon who was second and team-mate Sergio Perez who rounded out the top three.

A few rookies took part in the opening practice session at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez with Frederik Vesti jumping in Mercedes’ George Russell’s F1 W14, Oliver Bearman swapping for Kevin Magnussen in the Haas VF-23, Jack Doohan in place for Pierre Gasly in the Alpine A523, Theo Pourchaire piloting the Alfa Romeo C43 for Valtteri Bottas and Isack Hadjar driving the AlphaTauri AT04 for regular Yuki Tsunoda.

Verstappen’s session-topping effort of a 1:19.718 on the red side-walled C5 softer compound was 0.095 seconds faster than Albon as Perez was a further 0.297 adrift of his team-mate in third at his home Grand Prix.

Verstappen’s time dispatched McLaren’s Lando Norris from P1 as the latter had been amongst the first of the drivers to switch to the softs.

Norris had gone a very narrow 0.008 seconds quicker than Verstappen’s C4 yellow-marked medium tyre effort of a 1:20.245 – but the Dutchman returned to the top of the pile with his initial soft flyer.

Albon then posted the best sector one time as he offered the three-time world champion a challenge, and although the Thai-Briton driver lost a bit of time in the final two sectors, he still sat within a tenth of his former team-mate.

This allowed the Williams driver to split the Red Bull RB19 entries as Perez was 0.297 seconds off his team-mate’s leading benchmark. This put Albon above Norris after the Briton’s momentarily spell at the top.

Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc completed the top five after overcoming early worries after reporting over the radio of a “metal noise” at full-throttle on his opening laps of the track.

The majority, apart from McLaren’s Oscar Piastri, had tested Pirelli’s trial C4 compound in the opening 15 minutes of the session prior to the exploration of the C3, C4 and C5 rubber to be used over the rest of the weekend. Piastri used his prototype compound later to post his effort, which put him sixth overall on the classification.

The other Ferrari SF-23 entry of Carlos Sainz was seventh quickest despite suffering a hydraulics problem early on, which forced the Spaniard to return back slowly to the pit-lane in fourth gear. The Scuderia managed to fix his car that allowed Sainz to continue running unabated.

AlphaTauri’s Daniel Ricciardo came within a tenth of the Ferrari driver in eighth place as Alpine’s Esteban Ocon and Aston Martin’s Lance Stroll rounded out the top ten runners.

Mercedes’ Sir Lewis Hamilton ended the session outside the top ten in 11th place and ahead of Haas F1 Team’s Nico Hulkenberg who made a late improvement on the softs to take 12th, Alfa Romeo’s Zhou Guanyu who finished Free Practice One 13th and Williams’ Logan Sargeant who ended FP1 14th.

Haas F1 Team’s Bearman who took 15th and in-front of Aston Martin’s Alonso who was 16th, AlphaTauri’s Hadjar who came 17th in the classification and Alpine’s Doohan who placed 18th in the order.

Mercedes reserve Vesti and Alfa Romeo’s Pourchaire brought up the rear.

You can see the full Formula 1 Gran Premio De La Ciudad De Mexico 2023 Free Practice 1 Results Classification at the link: https://www.formula1.com/en/results.html/2023/races/1223/mexico/practice-1.html

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