Verstappen Closing In, Driver Decisions, and more ahead of the Mexico City Grand Prix

What happened at the 2025 United States Grand Prix?

The 2025 United States Grand Prix brought two races: a sprint and a full race. Pole for both? Verstappen. Winner for both? Verstappen. Fastest lap for both? Verstappen...and Antonelli. You really thought. Still, though, what a weekend for the Red Bull star in a car that now looks good enough to win every race through Abu Dhabi. Verstappen now sits only 40 points behind Piastri, a very obtainable margin with five races still remaining and the clearly quicker car.

The sprint was absolute chaos. Nico Hulkenberg caused a ginormous crash into the first turn, knocking out a decent amount of the field, including, most importantly, both Oscar Piastri and Lando Norris. From there, Verstappen, who was able to escape from the turn unscathed, went on to dominate the sprint, winning the race by over three tenths and never giving up the lead. Russel finished second with another strong weekend and Sainz claimed his second podium of the season with a quiet ascent up to P3.

The race was much calmer, with only one driver DNFing (Sainz) and Verstappen winning by over seven seconds. Tsunoda, Hulkenberg, and Bearman all scored points to round out the top ten, but the more interesting battles were for P2 and P4. Leclerc passed Norris in the opening turn and, with weaker tires and a much slower car, managed to hold off Norris for an extremely long period before finally being passed and finishing with a very deserving podium and P3. Hamilton passed both Piastri and Russell and held P4 above the two to complete a 3-4 weekend for Ferrari at their most successful circuit in the past couple of years.

What happened in FP1 and FP2 in Mexico City?

Free Practice 1 was extremely interesting as it allowed us to get a glimpse of the potential future of F1. Junior and reserve drivers Pato O'Ward (McLaren), Arvid Lindblad (Red Bull), Frederik Vesti (Mercedes), Antonio Fuoco (Ferrari), Jak Crawford (Aston Martin), Luke Browning (Williams), Ayumu Iwasa (Racing Bulls), Ryo Hirakawa (Haas), and Paul Aron (Alpine) all made showings in FP1, with Lindblad even finishing P6. In fact, the only team that didn't replace a driver with a reserve or junior driver was Kick Sauber, who had Bortoleto and Hulkenberg in their FP1 cars.

FP2 gave us much more insight into how this year's grid will fare in Mexico City, as all twenty current drivers were in their respective cars during the session. Verstappen again impressed, topping the timetables with Leclerc and Antonelli following. Tsunoda, Sainz, and both Aston Martins were other noteworthy top-10 finishers in FP2. Outside of the points, however, was a very concerningly slow Oscar Piastri, who was almost an entire second behind Verstappen and in P12.

Podium Predictions

Here are my predictions for the podium finishers at the 2025 Mexico City Grand Prix:

Mexico City Grand Prix

1. Max Verstappen (Red Bull)

   
   

2. Lando Norris (McLaren)

   
   

3. George Russell (Mercedes)

Five Spicy Hot Takes

Now, let’s spice things up with some bold hot takes for the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, rated from 1 to 5 spicy pepper emojis:

1. 🌶️ - Verstappen will win the race...by over ten seconds. Wait, what? I know, it's such a hot take. Yes, I think that Verstappen is good enough and quick enough to take a huge lead in this Grand Prix. He was almost a second faster than Piastri, who currently leads the Championship, so is it really that unrealistic? I'm starting to think about 2023 at the moment.

   
   

2. 🌶️🌶️ - Piastri misses the top five. Something seems to be going terribly wrong for Oscar Piastri. Yes, the McLaren car is clearly slower than the Red Bull at the moment, but Norris seems to still be turning the woes into decent results. Piastri's last three races? 20th, 4th, and 5th. And this weekend, he looks even slower.

   
   

3. 🌶️🌶️🌶️ - Albon finally scores. As a Williams fan, last weekend was especially difficult to watch. Albon's crash on lap one. Sainz's crash on lap six. Sure, the sprint was decent, but Albon has done nothing in the last few races. Albon's last three results are P13, P14, and P14 again. I think it's time for some points.

   
   

4. 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️ - Both Racing Bulls in the top ten. Lawson and Hadjar have only finished in the top ten together twice, but this feels like the weekend that they get their third double points finish. I don't know why. It just will happen.

   
   

5. 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️ - Lindblad or Aron. I think that either Arvid Lindblad or Paul Aron will be granted a seat in F1 between now and the Sao Paolo Grand Prix in a couple of weekends. Lindblad's more likely, but Colapinto still hasn't scored, and both drivers are knocking on the door. It's only a matter of time.