The Mexico City Grand Prix is the second leg of the American series of three consecutive races. From Austin, the teams moved to Mexico’s capital, to the Rodriguez Brothers Autodrome, where the city government sponsored the stage for the third year and adopted the name for itself. Supplies and equipment were delivered on Monday and the teams returned to work on Tuesday morning after their only day off. Another race weekend is coming up, this time without the Saturday sprint.
Liberty Media continues to experiment with the weekend schedule, this year it has been pushed forward in Mexico City and Sunday’s race will be the last, starting at 11pm Moscow time. The later sessions of the season were the sprint in Austin and the second practice in Mexico City, which started at 1am.
An important feature of the Rodriguez brothers’ race track is its high altitude. And if an altitude of 2285 meters has virtually no effect on the efficiency of hybrid power plants, it will have a very radical effect on aerodynamics.
The teams will tune their cars to the maximum level of downforce – and those with more efficient aerodynamics will gain an advantage, but even at nothing the actual downforce will be less than in Monza. The cars will behave nervously when braking, the race on the Mexican circuit is an excellent test of the drivers’ skills.
Overtaking is difficult on the Mexican circuit, a lot depends on the starting position, a good start and the optimal strategy.
Last year Max Verstappen won 15 Grand Prix during the season, setting a new all-time record, and now there are four stages to go and he came to Mexico City for his 16th win. There has never been such dominance in the history of Formula 1.
Demand for tickets was huge – and this weekend we will see a full house again. The Rodriguez Brothers Circuit is a ‘one-driver circuit’, like Zandvoort or Silverstone, especially when that driver drives the best car of the season.
All 400,000 spectators in Mexico City will root for Sergio Perez. In Austin the stands were already chanting his name and booing Verstappen on the podium, and this week the situation will be even more tense. Especially after Red Bull consultant Helmut Marko’s comment that “Sergio is not as focused on work as Verstappen and Vettel because of his South American roots.” This caused harsh criticism, so Marco had to apologize.
Perez fans will remember last year’s Sao Paulo Grand Prix where Perez was asked to let Verstappen pass so he could try to get ahead of Alonso and promised to regain the position if overtaking failed. Max was unable to overtake the Spaniard and refused to give back the position, asking him not to contact him again with such requests.
Since then, Red Bull Racing teammates have only communicated in public. The best way for the team to calm the situation is to give Perez the chance to win his home race, which, after Hamilton’s disqualification in Austin, practically guarantees him the title of vice-champion at the end of the season. But Verstappen is unlikely to agree to give up another win, even though his tournament goals for this year have long been resolved.
Source: F1 News
I am Christopher Clyde, an experienced journalist and content writer with a passion for sports. I have been writing about Formula 1 news for the past five years and am currently employed as an author at athletistic.com, one of the top sports websites in the US.
