(Reuters) – Team by team analysis of Sunday’s Mexico City Formula One Grand Prix, the 20th race of the 22-round season (listed in championship order):
RED BULL (Max Verstappen 1, Sergio Perez 3)
Verstappen won for a record 14th time this season and his fourth time in Mexico. He led from pole, starting on soft tyres and switching to mediums for a long final stint. He now has 34 career wins and set a record for most points in a season. Perez finished third at home for the second year in a row and is now second overall. He was held up by a slow tyre change.
FERRARI (Carlos Sainz 5, Charles Leclerc 6)
The Ferraris were the last unlapped cars but still way off the pace, with Sainz 58 seconds adrift of the winner. Both started on soft tyres and then switched to mediums. Leclerc, making his 100th F1 start, passed Bottas on lap one to gain a place. Ferrari are now only 40 points clear of Mercedes.
MERCEDES (Lewis Hamilton 2, George Russell 4)
Both drivers led briefly during the pitstops after starting on medium tyres and running longer than Red Bull. Hamilton pitted at the end of lap 29 for hards, with Russell doing the same on lap 34. Russell started on the front row but lost out to his team mate and Perez. He made a late stop for softs at the end of lap 69 and bagged a bonus point for fastest lap. Hamilton moved up to fifth overall and ahead of Sainz.
ALPINE (Esteban Ocon 8, Fernando Alonso 19th)
Alonso retired from eighth six laps from the end with a cylinder failure, but was classified. His retirement, parking up in the runoff area, triggered a virtual safety car. Ocon also had cooling issues late in the race. Both drivers finished the race on hard tyres, Ocon pitting on lap 34 and Alonso lap 42. Alpine are now just seven points clear of McLaren.
MCLAREN (Daniel Ricciardo 7, Lando Norris 9)
A race that left Ricciardo smiling again, with the Australian handed a 10-seconds penalty for colliding with Tsunoda but then pulling out a big gap on the faster soft tyres. Norris, on a medium-hard strategy, lost out at the start and let Ricciardo through late on to pass the Alpines. McLaren had the fastest pitstop of the year, a 1.98 second one for Ricciardo.
ALFA ROMEO (Valtteri Bottas 10, Zhou Guanyu 13)
Bottas returned to the points for the first time since Canada in June. Bottas qualified sixth but could not get his medium/hard strategy to work, failing to get temperature into the tyres after the stop.
ASTON MARTIN (Sebastian Vettel 14, Lance Stroll 15)
Stroll carried over a three-place grid penalty from Austin for causing a collision with Alonso and started last. Vettel moved up from 16th to 14th, going from softs to medium. Stroll made two stops, starting on used mediums and going to new softs.
HAAS (Mick Schumacher 16, Kevin Magnussen 17)
Schumacher started 15th on softs and lost two places on the opening lap while Magnussen lined up on mediums after a four place grid drop to 19th due to an engine change.
ALPHATAURI (Pierre Gasly 11, Yuki Tsunoda retired)
Gasly collected a five-seconds penalty for forcing Stroll off while overtaking on lap 14. He served it at his second stop. Tsunoda retired after the collision with Ricciardo while the Australian was trying to overtake. Tsunoda started on softs, Gasly on mediums. The Frenchman was 17th after lap one.
WILLIAMS (Alex Albon 12, Nicholas Latifi 18)
Albon started 17th but dropped to 19th, Latifi lined up 18th. Albon did a medium-soft one stop, Latifi switched early to hard tyres but struggled.
(Reporting by Alan Baldwin in London, editing by Peter Rutherford)
