Formula 1: Three out of three for Verstappen in free practice in Mexico

The qualifying tests at the Hermanos Rodríguez circuit begin on Saturday at midnight (Greek time) and Max Verstappen is already the clear favorite for pole position. At the same time, the long straights of the Mexico City circuit favor the characteristics of the Williams, and Alex Albon makes the most of them.

The Ferraris, which initially led the times in this third test, took turns with the Mercedes as the track still lacked grip – like Pierre Gasly’s Alpine 4-a-ke and the exit of Alpha Tauri’s Yuki Tsunoda at the same point, Foro Sol Arena stadium – which sparked footballing celebrations every time Sergio Perez passed by.

On his first attempt, Verstappen was a tenth behind Mercedes’ George Russell, always on the medium tyre, while Daniel Ricciardo – with a slipstream provided by Tsunoda – took fourth place, behind Lewis Hamilton and ahead of Sergio Perez with the other Mercedes W14 and Red Bull RB19 respectively

With their next laps, Verstappen and Perez moved up to first and third. Around the 40-minute mark, Alex Albon moved into first place with an impressive lap time of 1:17.957, although Russell couldn’t keep up. But Verstappen pulled it off with ten minutes to go, despite his complaints about the traffic, with a time of 1:17.887 that kept him in the lead until the end.

Perez was a further seven hundredths of a second behind Albon, but from there and back Russell was two tenths and Piastri a further one and a half tenths away – even though McLaren has looked very strong at this track since yesterday.

Lando Norris was less than a tenth slower than his Australian counterpart, but ended up in eighth place, as that tenth was edged out by Alfa Romeo’s Valtteri Bottas and Alpha Tauri’s Tsunoda, who left Ricciardo 49mm behind in ninth place.

Hamilton managed no better than tenth, six tenths of a second behind Verstappen – and despite saying yesterday that the Mercedes W14 felt like a completely different car to its performance in Texas a week earlier.

The traffic that Charles Leclerc and Carlos Sainz encountered at the end of their fast attempt left the Ferraris in 13th and 15th – Sainz also had a slip on the inside when Stroll blocked him. The Spaniard called for a penalty to be imposed on the Canadian, which he described as “dangerous”. Stroll finished 14th and Fernando Alonso 17th, on a track with aerodynamic features that exposed the Aston AMR23’s shortcomings.