Mexican Grand Prix race day
By: Geoff Creighton
Summary
Hamilton leads after all the pit stops are complete. Vettel and Bottas are behind but have over 10 laps fresher tyres than Hamilton. The gap is steady over two seconds with over three laps remaining | |
Leclerc has two stopped and, despite a slow second stop, managed to stay ahead of Albon who is on the same strategy | |
Verstappen's race imploded early but he's coming back. After early contact with Hamilton, he earned a puncture after an optimistic lunge on Bottas in the stadium section. He's up to eighth | |
The McLaren has been woeful on the hard tyre and Sainz has had to take an extra stop, losing what should have been a net sixth. He's well outside the top 10 now |
Status: Stopped
And here's the report - we hope you enjoyed the race, and we'll see you next weekend for the US Grand Prix:
An iffy day for fourth-placed Leclerc - if that was a conversion in the Rugby World Cup, he'd have kicked the ball rather wide.
A very flashy podium here at Mexico. Just in case you'd forgotten what all the drivers look like, they're accompanied by their portraits.
Word that Kvyat has a 10-second penalty for causing that collision with Hulkenberg. That puts Hulkenberg back into the points as a result.
Bottas: "I enjoyed it, considering yesterday it was a good result. The start was quite tricky and lost a place, so had to come back a little bit, but I don't think we could have done much more."
Vettel: "I think surprisingly the hard tyres worked really well. It was a long race with no break, but I think Lewis was just cruising for most of the second stint. I'm happy because it was a good race, but with strategy we could have been a bit sharper."
Hamilton: "Firstly, we've got to applaud this incredible crowd! Today's an incredible result, I have to say a huge thanks to our team. We came here thinking we were on the back foot - but we pulled through."
The irony here is that Hamilton has won his last two titles here without being on the podium, but having won he's got to wait another round to sew it up. You can't have it all.
Hulkenberg goes into the wall at the final corner! He seemed to chop off Kvyat and ended up being turned into the barrier. That helps Gasly move up to 10th.
Hamilton hangs on to win ahead of Vettel and Bottas, but that result means the title fight goes on to Austin in a week's time.
Two big midfield fights: Perez vs. Ricciardo, Hulkenberg vs. Kvyat. Points on offer, and one lap remains.
Leclerc is now back to 7.2s behind Hamilton - it looks like his chances of the win have gone unless something remarkable happens.
Hamilton sets a personal best lap - this would be an impressive drive if he can hang on - he leads Vettel by 2.3s with five laps left.
Ricciardo has dusted himself off and is closing in on Perez once again. He's just about to wind into DRS range...
"And we have max power overtake available," Mercedes informs Hamilton, who replies: "Ok, leave me to it for now."
So, with 10 laps to go, the question now seems to be if Hamilton's hard tyres can hang on after his early stop. The Ferrari charge seems to have stalled as we enter the final stages.
Ricciardo dives down the inside at turn 1, but goes very deep indeed! He has to concede the place to Perez, who hangs on for the time being.
Leclerc's charge has halted somewhat after that off-track moment - he's 7.3s behind Hamilton with 10 laps to go.
As it stands, Hamilton cannot secure the 2019 title today as he's only 74 points in front and needs to be 78.
Leclerc locked his left-front again in that incident, which cost him 1.6s to Hamilton and dropped him to 7.2s off the lead.
Ricciardo is now winding in Perez, he's a good chunk quicker than the Racing Point on his new medium boots.
It's worth keeping an eye on Albon too - he's 15.6s off the lead on the same two-stop strategy as Leclerc.
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