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F1 Mexican GP: Verstappen takes dominant win ahead of Hamilton and Perez

Max Verstappen dominated Formula 1’s 2021 Mexican Grand Prix ahead of Lewis Hamilton after making a bold first corner move, where it all went wrong for polesitter Valtteri Bottas.

Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing RB16B, Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes W12

Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing RB16B, Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes W12

Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

Sergio Perez finished third after Hamilton held off the Mexican driver’s stint two charge with a major tyre-life advantage versus the Mercedes.

At the start, Hamilton launched nicely off the line to quickly get up alongside Bottas on the inside run to the Turn 1 right-hander, while Verstappen closed in their wake and then took the outside line.

The Red Bull driver braked later, with more confidence and swept around the outside of his two rivals, holding his move to the outside and staying on the track – now in the lead.

As Verstappen and Hamilton headed in Turn 2, chaos unfolded behind them as Bottas was tipped into a spin by McLaren’s Daniel Ricciardo, who had locked up heavily on the inside of Turn 1.

As the Mercedes spun around, Perez cut across the inside to Bottas’s left, the track limits rule that Hamilton was in breach of in FP1 superseded for the first lap by a late order from F1 race director Michael Masi, with the rest of the pack jinking around.

In amongst the drama, Esteban Ocon was sandwiched between Yuki Tsunoda and Mick Schumacher – the damage in the ensuing contact putting the AlphaTauri driver out on the spot at Turn 2 and left the Haas stopped just past the exit of Turn 3 leading onto the second straight.

Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing RB16B, Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes W12, as Valtteri Bottas, Mercedes W12, spins and Daniel Ricciardo, McLaren MCL35M, runs wide at the start

Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing RB16B, Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes W12, as Valtteri Bottas, Mercedes W12, spins and Daniel Ricciardo, McLaren MCL35M, runs wide at the start

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

That safety car was called so the wreckage could be cleared, with Bottas stopping at the rear of the field to switch from the mediums all the leaders had started on to take the hards.

Ahead of the restart, Verstappen dropped Hamilton as he accelerated through the final corners of the stadium section and already had a lead of 0.9-seconds as the race went fully green once again at the start of lap five of 71.

From there, he shot clear of his title rival, lapping in the mid 1m21s as Hamilton began his opening stint in the low 1m22s, and then continuing to raise his pace – briefly reaching the high 1m20s – with a series of fastest laps in the 10 tours that followed the safety car coming in.

By lap 15 Verstappen’s lead was 5.4s, which he extended to nearly 10s – never under pressure from behind – by the time he pitted on lap 33.

As Verstappen disappeared, Hamilton was soon under more pressure to keep a gap ahead of Perez, who remained around two seconds behind the Mercedes throughout the opening stint, despite being urged to close up by his engineer on several occasions.

Hamilton was the first of the leaders to come in for hards, four laps before Verstappen – just as Perez had closed to 1.5s behind.

While Red Bull left Verstappen out for a little while, it left Perez out for 11 laps beyond Hamilton’s stop – setting up a significant tyre life off-set advantage for the second half of the race.

At the end of lap 42, Perez’s outlap, Verstappen led Hamilton by 9.8s, with Perez facing a 9.5s gap to close to the Briton over the rest of the race.

Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes W12, Sergio Perez, Red Bull Racing RB16B

Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes W12, Sergio Perez, Red Bull Racing RB16B

Photo by: Steven Tee / Motorsport Images

The leader, again completely untroubled out front, steadily pulled further away from Hamilton over the second stint to take a commanding win by 16.5s.

The main interest remained Perez’s attempts to catch Hamilton, which he did so solidly during the initial phase after his stop – the gap between them down to 5.7s at the end of lap 50 as the home hero regularly lapped in the mid 1m19s vs Hamilton’s low 1m20s.

Mercedes reckoned the second Red Bull would be close enough to make a move on the final lap, but in fact Perez’s pace was so good he closed to within DRS range at the start of lap 61.

At this stage, Hamilton was running behind the lapped Lando Norris, who had had enough pace to stay out of blue flag range for several laps, which aided Perez’s charge.

But when the McLaren moved aside on lap 62, Perez slipped out of DRS threat behind Hamilton, who was displaying mighty straight line speed – as Mercedes had against Red Bull all weekend.

That stalled Perez’s charge and he then fell back again as the pair lapped several backmarkers – including Fernando Alonso and the twice lapped George Russell (16th at the finish).

Perez did close in again on Hamilton to run within a second on the final lap, but his look up the inside of Turn 4 was never close to really threaten Hamilton’s position and he came home 1.1s behind.

Verstappen’s lead had actually been as high as 20s, but when Mercedes pitted Bottas for a third time in a bid to deprive the leader of the fastest lap, the pair were suddenly close on track and held each other up.

Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing RB16B

Max Verstappen, Red Bull Racing RB16B

Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images

Bottas, two laps down having chased Ricciardo on the fringes of the top 10 in the first half of the race, lost further ground with a slow second stop to move back to the mediums midway through.

He took one lap back by passing Verstappen, who then lapped Bottas again – with Mercedes then opting to bring the Finn in for a fourth time to chase the fastest lap on the final tour, which Bottas, in 15th place, secured with a 1m17.774s – although no point for that accolade will be awarded for this race because Bottas finished outside the top 10.

Behind the leaders, Pierre Gasly took a solid fourth place for AlphaTauri – running a lonely race well ahead of the two Ferraris.

Charles Leclerc was the lead driver home for the Scuderia – after being allowed back past Carlos Sainz Jr late on, as the pair had already swapped to allow the Spaniard a chance to close on Gasly after he had completed a long first stint.

But when that did not pay off, Leclerc, who had gained ground in the first corner melee – where both Ferraris were off track at one point – was moved back ahead of and finished as the last driver on the lead lap.

Sebastian Vettel took seventh ahead of Kimi Raikkonen, with Alonso finishing ahead of Norris at the tail end of the top 10.

F1 Mexican GP - race results

Cla Driver Laps Time Points
1 Netherlands Max Verstappen 71 - 25
2 United Kingdom Lewis Hamilton 71 16.555 18
3 Mexico Sergio Perez 71 17.752 15
4 France Pierre Gasly 71 1'03.845 12
5 Monaco Charles Leclerc 71 1'21.037 10
6 Spain Carlos Sainz Jr. 70 1 lap 8
7 Germany Sebastian Vettel 70 1 lap 6
8 Finland Kimi Raikkonen 70 1 lap 4
9 Spain Fernando Alonso 70 1 lap 2
10 United Kingdom Lando Norris 70 1 lap 1
11 Italy Antonio Giovinazzi 70 1 lap  
12 Australia Daniel Ricciardo 70 1 lap  
13 France Esteban Ocon 70 1 lap  
14 Canada Lance Stroll 69 2 laps  
15 Finland Valtteri Bottas 69 2 laps  
16 United Kingdom George Russell 69 2 laps  
17 Canada Nicholas Latifi 69 2 laps  
18 Russian Federation Nikita Mazepin 68 3 laps  
19 Germany Mick Schumacher 0    
20 Japan Yuki Tsunoda 0    

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