After a successful Friday for Red Bull Racing, they are preparing for VT3 and qualifying for the Mexican Grand Prix. At Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez, the F1 gentlemen will be in action on Saturday evening. Due to the time difference with South America, the pit light goes out at 9 pm Dutch time and the drivers drive onto the tarmac for Q1.
Due to the time difference with Mexico City, the start of qualifying is therefore slightly different than usual. The Netherlands is seven hours ahead of Mexico, which means that the session will be held locally at 2 p.m. For the Netherlands, however, this means an evening session, while the third free practice of the Mexican Grand Prix weekend starts at 6 pm.
The Friday sessions looked good for Max Verstappen and Sergio Pérez. Red Bull Racing, as expected, seems to have a lot of pace on the circuit that is 2.2 kilometers above sea level. The thinner air around the circuit brings advantages that can be felt especially for Red Bull. After all, the larger turbo of the Honda engine offers a relatively smaller loss of power than, for example, competitor Mercedes.
Verstappen excels in VT2
In the second free practice in Mexico, it was mainly Verstappen who excelled. While it was still Mercedes that took the longest in the first session of the weekend, Verstappen put both Mercedes about half a second behind during the afternoon session. So it seems that the Limburger has the speed to convincingly take pole position in qualifying.
The most likely competitor for that first starting spot is arguably Pérez at the moment. The Mexican is driving his home Grand Prix and wants to score. With the Red Bull, he finally has a car at his disposal in which he can win his home race. After equaling the lap times of the Mercedes men in VT2, it seems that with a perfect lap he could occupy the front row of the grid together with Verstappen.
As mentioned, Lewis Hamilton and Valtteri Bottas had a strong first session, but a lesser second session. The Mercedes duo saw Verstappen disappear on the horizon, while CEO Andrew Shovlin later indicated that Mercedes was struggling with balance problems. Combined with the weaker engine, the Brackley team still has a lot to straighten out before entering qualifying.
