Formula 1's 2025 Mexican Grand Prix produced plenty of drama right from a chaotic opening lap, as the championship lead changed hands for the first time in over six months.
Here's what we learned from the Mexico weekend...
Anger over ‘lawnmower’ racing
Multiple drivers were unimpressed with the “lawnmower racing” (as George Russell described it to Sky Sports F1) that was going on at the first turn in Mexico.
Charles Leclerc and Verstappen were among those to skip across the grass at the start of the race and make gains which others felt were unearned.
Hamilton felt like he’d been punished for obeying track limits.
“I had a great start. We broke into Turn 1, I was in P2, I navigated through [Turns] 1, 2 and 3, I didn't go off track. Others cut it and held position and didn't get penalties. [It] was pretty nuts,” he said.
Fernando Alonso says he “lost four places by doing the track” with rivals “appearing like three places in front of me”, having been side-by-side with him through Turn 1.
Aston Martin’s chief trackside officer Mike Krack, said he could understand Alonso’s anger, adding: “in lap one, I had the feeling that everybody just does what he wants, and you get away with it”.
He pointed out that the stewards have a difficult job in policing it and the particular layout of Mexico’s opening corners makes it one of the worst offenders for opening lap chaos. - Josh Suttill
Red Bull's big Tsunoda praise doesn't match the result
He might have qualified and finished in 11th place, but Red Bull team boss Laurent Mekies believes Yuki Tsunoda has just had “his best weekend in a long time”.
Mekies explained: “He was very, very close in quali to Max. I think it was two tenths [0.211s] in Q2.” That was his second smallest qualifying deficit to Verstappen of the season.
“The first stint was very strong as well, two tenths or three tenths [per lap compared to] Max on the same, very long first stint on the medium.
“Then, after that, fair enough, [the blame] it's on our side. We left him out a little bit longer because there was an advantage for us to do that.”
By that, Mekies means Tsunoda became a bit of a sacrificial lamb to help Verstappen’s podium bid.
Plus, Tsunoda had an 11.85s pitstop that allowed Gabriel Bortoleto’s Sauber to overcut him for what would turn out to be the final points-paying position.
Mekies believes Tsunoda is “making steps forward” so Red Bull can take more time before making its 2026 driver call.
That doesn’t mean Tsunoda is suddenly safe. Part of the logic is that Red Bull doesn’t want any distractions from Verstappen’s title bid.
But it has at least noticed a much-needed improvement in Tsunoda, who has finally proved himself useful to Verstappen’s title bid and given a boost to his 2026 seat chances. - JS
Haas can get it right when it counts
Too many times this season, Haas missed out on scoring points when the speed of its car (and usually Ollie Bearman) could easily have been achieved.
But it came together in a big way in Mexico, where the upgraded VF-25 was very strong, especially in race trim. And Bearman was faultless after opportunistically hauling himself into a group of faster cars on merit, even though he was “s***ing myself” while racing Max Verstappen wheel-to-wheel in the first half of the race.
For a while, Bearman and Haas dreamed of a first podium. Some might say they should have rolled the dice on a one-stop to try to hang on to third. But the charge from Verstappen shows Bearman would have lost that position anyway.
So, in opting for a two-stop, sacrificing track position, and accepting a lesser result, rather than risk losing everything by fading late on with older tyres, Haas made a pragmatic call that could have a much bigger reward than one moment of glory.
It has given the team a massive boost in the fight for sixth in the championship that could be worth tens of millions in prize money come the end of the year.
And fourth place - a best-ever result for driver and team - is still a fine outcome in itself. - Scott Mitchell-Malm
Aston Martin is still baffled by Mexico
Aston Martin has failed to score a single point at the Mexican Grand Prix during this rules era. In four attempts from 2022 to this year’s race, it has a best finish of 11th - and never looked like being in the mix to better that on Sunday.
There’s something about the low-grip track, big wings/low-downforce combination at this air density, and circuit layout with a very long straight, that does not play well at all with Aston Martin’s struggles with aerodynamic efficiency and on circuits that demand certain compromises.
“In terms of understanding Mexico, we still have work to do,” admitted chief trackside officer Mike Krack.
To rub salt into the wound of an uncompetitive weekend, Lance Stroll had a needless and self-inflicted spin on the opening lap, and Fernando Alonso retired after rising brake temperatures made his brake pedal go long.
As Alonso lamented, “luck is not definitely with me” at a race he’s retired in at each of the last three attempts. - SMM
Lawson got an apology, F1 got away with one
Thankfully, the Mexican Grand Prix may be remembered for a frightening near miss rather than anything more serious.
Liam Lawson was understandably enraged when he encountered two marshals running across the track in front of him on the exit of Turn 1 when he’d had to make an early pitstop for repairs.
The FIA officials apologised to Lawson, who told his team “he could’ve f***ing killed someone” had things panned out slightly differently on track.
The FIA is still chasing answers to how this happened. The marshals were told to retrieve debris at that corner, but that order was rescinded when Lawson made his pitstop - clearly that message wasn’t properly received.
F1 can count itself lucky that something more serious didn’t occur, but there are serious questions that it must answer to avoid a repeat in the future. - JS
Piastri is in a potentially title-killing slump
Oscar Piastri is facing the toughest phase of his short F1 career right now, with his championship lead obliterated and lost to team-mate Lando Norris, and a slump in form that threatens to wipe him out of title contention if it can’t be quickly stopped.
Piastri’s gap to Norris in Austin was two or three tenths, but it grew to in excess of half a second in Mexico.
What’s worrying is the laptime bleed to Norris was consistent throughout the lap, there wasn't one particular problematic corner or sequence, so finding a fix wasn’t easy.
He mounted a decent recovery on Sunday, but only after making his life harder with a tricky opening lap that dropped him down to ninth.
McLaren team boss Andrea Stella believes it’s these “special low-grip conditions” across Austin and Mexico that Piastri’s struggling in.
The cars slide around a lot in those conditions, which means Piastri has to drive in a way that “not necessarily feels natural”.
If Stella’s right, then it should be normal service resumed for Piastri in different conditions during F1’s final four races.
But what if Piastri’s struggles continue even on grippier tracks like Brazil (if it's dry)?
After all, it’s quite the sizeable performance deficit to Norris. For that to suddenly be obliterated would probably be as equally shocking as its onset in the first place.
Piastri’s title hopes certainly depend on it. Otherwise, all of that good work in the first two-thirds of the season will be for nought. - JS
Norris’s well-timed breakthrough
Piastri’s struggles have coincided with a well-timed breakthrough for Norris on the other side of the McLaren garage.
Now it’s worth noting the exact kind of low-grip conditions that Piastri has struggled in, Norris often thrives in. So there is an element of the recent tracks playing to Norris’s strengths.
But In Mexico, Norris was at his very best with his most complete weekend in F1 so far. He’d had dominant races before at Zandvoort and Singapore last year or Monaco this year, but this was the most complete weekend from start to finish.
Norris puts this down to an important 30-minute debrief after Singapore, where he explained to the team how the car was behaving in a way he didn’t like and why changes were necessary.
This has returned some much-needed feeling behind the wheel for Norris across Austin and Mexico, that’s been reflected in the results.
It remains to be seen if it’s enough to hold off Verstappen’s charging title push, but a continuation of this kind of Norris form would stand him in very good stead to win the intra-team fight at least. - JS
Alpine’s season can get worse
Alpine’s had plenty of poor weekends in 2025, but Mexico proved to be particularly woeful as Alpine’s main job became ensuring it didn’t get in the way of the cars that were lapping it, and avoiding any of the team orders angst of Austin.
“With the frontrunners coming through with blue flags, we managed both cars equally and carefully to not interfere with those lapping us, while giving them both the chance to at least compete for position without taking any unnecessary risks,” managing director Steve Nielsen explained.
Alpine's was firmly the slowest car in Mexico, failing to get anywhere close to Q2 on Saturday and running at the back of the classified finishers on Sunday - making for “a long and lonely afternoon” in the words of Franco Colapinto.
Alpine now heads to Brazil - scene of its double podium last year - where even scoring a point (for the first time since Spa) would feel like an equally seismic shock. - JS
Bortoleto’s bounceback proved a point
Gabriel Bortoleto’s 10th place is unique among his five points finishes in F1 because it’s the first time he’s had to fight his way there from a lowly starting position.
Unlike in Austin a week earlier, Bortoleto’s underlying pace was decent, it’s just that Q1 got away from him thanks to a lock-up on his first run then “a bad one” on his second run as he struggled with over-rotation.
“Gabriel’s qualifying was dominated by a tiny little snap into Turn 1, which overheated the tyres,” said Sauber team principal Jonathan Wheatley. “It’s relentless, this track, once you’ve got tyres that have overheated at Turn 1.”
Bortoleto was frustrated because, unlike in Austin, he felt “very comfortable and confident with the car”. From 16th on the grid, he had some work to do in the race.
He jumped to 13th at the start, then passed Sainz to move up to 12th, which gave him a firm foundation to build from. He couldn’t make an impact on fellow medium-runner Hadjar in the first stint, although Bortoleto was helped by Tsunoda losing nine seconds in his pitstop.
He ran three laps longer than Hadjar and, after quickly closing in, it turned into a long game as he looked for a way past, one that Bortoleto won when he battled past late on with an aggressive move around Hadjar's outside at Turn 1.
“At some point I [had] tried so many times I said ‘whatever happens, happens, if we crash, we crash, but at least I need to go for it’. So it worked out very well. It was a tough fight with him, but he was clean, I was clean, and everything was cool.”
His reward was a valuable point for Sauber, given it’s in a group of four teams vying for sixth in the constructors’ championship. And it required a well-executed and attacking race drive. - Edd Straw
