2026 Mexico City Grand Prix Race Review

Linus O'Howell

26 minutes ago

5 min read

Verstappen Wins as Antonelli Crowned Youngest World Champion

Maxico struck once again as Max Verstappen took victory around Mexico City as Andrea Kimi Antonelli became the youngest World Champion in Formula 1 history! Lewis Hamilton came home second after drama with his teammate, whilst Kimi Antonelli was able to round out a pretty iconic Podium!

The Biggest Talking Points

When the lights went out, George Russell’s car lost a ton of power towards the end of the straight, losing a ton of positions, as Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc got close together into Turn 1! Leclerc would then attempt an audacious move around the outside of his teammate into Turn 4, with both Ferraris going off the track as Max Verstappen was able to jump Hamilton for second! George Russell and Isack Hadjar would then come together, resulting in Russell receiving a 10-second time penalty after Hadjar went spinning off, whilst Leclerc was later given a 5-second time penalty for going off the track and gaining a lasting advantage! As expected, Lewis Hamilton was rather aggrieved with this decision, with Lewis claiming that the stewards were “handing Charles the win”! Aston Martin would then suffer a double DNF, with neither Lance Stroll nor Fernando Alonso able to complete more than 7 laps, whilst we’d later get a change for the lead after Verstappen jumped Leclerc in the pits (due to Charles serving his penalty)! Hamilton would then pit a lap later, coming out a couple of seconds behind his teammate, as Andrea Kimi Antonelli would find himself in the lead of the Grand Prix, albeit with a pit stop still needing to be made! A lap after Kimi made that pit stop, a Safety Car was brought out after Valtteri Bottas suffered a horrible crash into the barriers at Turn 1 after the front-left suspension on his Cadillac completely snapped! This isn’t the first time that this has happened for Cadillac this season, and it simply can’t continue! Incredibly, Hamilton would then make a pit stop, dropping him behind Antonelli, only for a Red Flag to come out! This rightly led to another rant from Lewis towards his team, although he would get put back into P3 (by the FIA) for reasons unknown to me!

When the Race got back underway, Lewis Hamilton was quickly able to jump ahead of Charles Leclerc, with Leclerc locking up massively into Turn 1, as Hamilton and Max Verstappen made contact over the lead of the Race! Max would be able to remain in the lead coming out of Turn 3, but the same couldn’t be said for Oliver Bearman, who got smashed into the back of by Nico Hulkenberg! A massive shame for Ollie as he was in contention for points all day! At the start of the next lap, Kimi Antonelli would pull off a great move to dispatch Leclerc for P3, whilst we then saw more flaws with the circuit as Lando Norris was never able to overtake Charles, despite the fact that he had a clear pace advantage! Arvid Lindblad, who was having a rather brilliant afternoon up to this point, saw his chance of scoring good points dashed after making contact with Oscar Piastri at Turn 2, resulting in a Safety Car! At the restart, Verstappen was able to once again keep Hamilton at bay, with Pierre Gasly cutting over the grass after battling with Alpine teammate Franco Colapinto; an incident that allowed Liam Lawson up to P9 (from the pit lane)! The rest of the Grand Prix would then be pretty frustrating, with it being basically impossible to overtake as Norris continuously failed to overtake Leclerc! However, we’re not done there, as after the Race, Oscar Piastri was given a 10-second time penalty for the incident with Lindblad, dropping him out of the points entirely, whilst both Alpine drivers would also be demoted out of the points for yellow flag infringements! This meant that Liam Lawson, Gabriel Bortoleto, and Isack Hadjar were all promoted up a few places, whilst Ryo Hirakawa ended up finishing 10th; scoring a point on his Formula 1 debut! A quick mention should also go to home hero Sergio Perez, with Checo running really well earlier in the Grand Prix, only for it to fall away for him after both a bad pit stop and receiving a 5-second time penalty for speeding in the pit lane!

The Standout Drives in the Race

I’ve given out three 10’s for the 2026 Mexico City Grand Prix, and the first one is obviously for Max Verstappen! Throughout all of the drama with the two Ferraris, and the big celebrations for a new World Champion, it would be silly to forget that Max won this Race from P5; a very impressive achievement at a track that you’re not supposed to be able to overtake at! The second driver I’ve given out maximum points to is Liam Lawson, and yes, there was a ton of carnage that helped his overall finishing position, but Liam went from the pit lane to P7; Lawson literally can’t finish anywhere but best of the rest! That’s insane! The final driver I’ve given a Perfect 10 to is Ryo Hirakawa, and let’s be honest, this is probably the only time I’m ever going to be able to give Hirakawa this grade, so given the fact that we didn’t even know he was driving on Thursday’s Preview, a point for Ryo on debut is a major success story! Elsewhere, Lewis Hamilton clearly had the pace to win in Mexico City, whilst Gabriel Bortoleto will be delighted to have finally scored some points! Arvid Lindblad and Oliver Bearman also deserve a mention in this category, as until they got taken out, they were both in contention for positive points-scoring finishes! Then there’s Andrea Kimi Antonelli, who honestly deserves his own section after becoming the Formula 1 Champion of the World at just 20 years old! Kimi is generational!

Drivers Who Had a Shocker

I actually haven’t given out any 1’s for this Race, although I definitely could for some teams! Driver-wise, Nico Hulkenberg made a poor mistake that resulted in both his and Oliver Bearman’s afternoons being ruined, whilst Oscar Piastri coming together with Arvid Lindblad wasn’t ideal! However, I’m not convinced that the incident was worthy of a 10-second time penalty for Piastri! The most important thing from this Race is the fact that Valtteri Bottas is okay after a pretty scary crash, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t highlight the fact that Bottas was majorly slow in comparison to his Cadillac teammate (yet again)! Things also went wrong for George Russell, although once again, I’m not convinced that that was George’s fault! Then there’s the teams, starting with Ferrari! We’ve spoken time and time again, both in articles and on the Podcast, that Ferrari need to sort their driver situation out, and this is another example as to why! Charles Leclerc’s desperation to beat Lewis Hamilton cost the team an easy 1-2, with neither driver winning the Race! Another failure from the Scuderia! Also, Alpine have to be mentioned here after going from a double-points finish to scoring nothing yet again (due to post-Race penalties), whilst don’t even get me started on Aston Martin failing to last longer than 7 laps! That team is a joke!