Photo credit: Red Bull Racing
Formula 1 is on track again for the second session of the day in a sunny Mexico City, 2.240 m above the sea that make it quite tough for cars to run through the thin air surrounding the Autodromo.
FP1 saw crowned champion Max Verstappen leading the way ahead of Alex Albon and home hero Sergio Perez.
After stepping out to leave the seat to rookie Frederik Vesti, George Russell is now returning at the wheel of his W14 and he is the very first one to go out on track.
Pirelli has brought along a new C4 compound as a prototype to test in hopes of reducing graining on the tyres and that is the main choice around the grid for the start of this session.
As the first timed laps are being registered and rain is starting to fall on the asphalt Alex Albon – making the most of Williams’ straight line speed on the main straight that is quite long around here – goes fastest ahead of Verstappen with a 1,20.075 s lap.
Meanwhile Alfa Romeo is struggling in and out of the garage, with Bottas at the bottom of the timesheet after participating with only one car to FP1.
With the track remaining dry and rain ceasing down most cars start to switch to medium tyres and it’s Verstappen and Charles Leclerc leading ahead of Daniel Ricciardo in third.
The McLaren of Oscar Piastri is the first to come out of the pits on the softest compound and it shows as he soon goes fastest, followed by Alex Albon.
A bit of a less fortunate debut on softs for Fernando Alonso and Logan Sargeant, as one spins his Aston Martin and the other ends up far behind his teammate.
Meanwhile Yuki Tsunoda is making the most of this session to get a feel of the mediums, after he missed FP1 to leave space for Isack Hadjar and will be starting the race from the back of the grid for changing several parts of his AT04.
A tricky turn at the final corner for Sergio Perez, but he manages to keep his Red Bull out of the wall, all the while Bottas climbs his way up to P4 behind Leclerc and even opens DRS in a quest to keep the position that makes Verstappen have a laugh with his engineer.
In the final minutes the risk of rain had increased, but the chequered flag is waved marking the end of this FP2 with Max Verstappen yet again being the fastest, followed by Lando Norris who had a good run in his McLaren.
Quite the opposite a few doors down in the garage, as Aston closed the day with Fernando Alonso in 20th and Lance Stroll in 18th after only managing to complete 17 laps for an issue with his front-left wheel.
