Mercedes drivers Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton were fastest in the first free practice for the Formula 1 Mexican Grand prix. The Finn has outpaced his teammate with 0.466 seconds. Third and fourth came Red Bull’s Max Verstappen and Daniel Ricciardo. The Ferrari drivers were fifth and sixth – Sebastian Vettel was in front of Kimi Raikkonen.
The weather at the beginning of the first session was sunny. The air temperature was almost 15 degrees, that of the track – nearly 28. There were four driver changes: Alfonso Celis took Esteban Ocon’s cockpit in Force India, Sean Gelael was in Pierre Gasly’s Toro Rosso, Antonio Giovinazzi drove instead of Romain Grosjean (Haas) and Charles Leclerc replaced Marcus Ericsson in Sauber.
The drivers of the three big teams changed at the top of the standings throughout the whole session. Meanwhile, the stewards officially confirmed the expected penalties for McLaren’s Fernando Alonso and Stoffel Vandoorne. Both of their power units were with changed components, thus the drivers will be at the back of the grid. Vandoorne did not appear on track through the whole session.
Mercedes drivers Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton were fastest in the first free practice for the Formula 1 Mexican Grand prix
The track was quite dirty and may drivers went off it. Alfonso Celis caused the biggest disruption. He crashed at turn 4 and the race control stopped the session until the marshals cleared the debris.
When practice restarted, there were only 23 minutes left. Red Bull’s team principal Christian Horner announced that Verstappen would not get back on track. The team was making a big set-up change in his car.
The Mercedes drivers remained first and second until the end of the session. Red Bull and Ferrari though did not try ultrasoft tyres so their real pace was not clear right away.
INITIAL CLASSIFICATION (END OF FP1): A successful morning for @MercedesAMGF1 #MexicoGP ?? #FP1 pic.twitter.com/GXdMM3hfON
— Formula 1 (@F1) October 27, 2017
