Piastri heads Norris, Sainz in final practice

Oscar Piastri completed the final practice session ahead of the Mexican Grand Prix on top of the timesheets, 0.059 seconds clear of McLaren Formula 1 team-mate Lando Norris.

The two McLarens had sat about three tenths clear of the rest of the field led by early session headliner Carlos Sainz, as the Ferrari driver could not capitalise on his pace in the first half of the session.

In response to FP2 being employed as a Pirelli tyre test, the drivers spent the early laps getting experience with the soft and medium tyres.

Max Verstappen set the first lap on soft tyres straight out of the gate as he sought to make up for limited running on Friday; the Dutchman’s power unit was changed to overcome the air leak that plagued him yesterday. He set the pace with a 1m18.397s, but this was swiftly beaten.

George Russell, another driver recovering from Friday’s woes after his FP2 necessitated a chassis switch, found a 1m18.284s – but Lewis Hamilton had this beaten by about a tenth and a half.

Sainz then broke below the 1m18s barrier to log a 1m17.825s lap, which team-mate Charles Leclerc got close to; Sainz then improved to a 1m17.447s to raise the bar, and improved again by a tenth to continue his presence at the top of the order.

Verstappen kicked off the bonafide qualifying simulations with a 1m17.003s but looked scruffy in the middle sector, and this left his lap open to Lando Norris’ subsequent effort. The Briton put together a 1m16.551s to put distance between himself and Verstappen, although Oscar Piastri found half a tenth over his team-mate to go quickest.

Sainz was third fastest with a 1m16.832s, ensuring that he also moved ahead of Verstappen – who struggled with front braking and failed to improve on his follow-up effort.

Although Hamilton felt that his own lap to go fifth fastest had been a good one, he was alarmed by the over-half-second pace deficit to the McLarens.

A late attempt by Charles Leclerc to rise higher than sixth looked to be on as he improved in the opening sector, but lost time in the middle part of the lap thanks to traffic on his lap at the death of the session.

Yuki Tsunoda was seventh fastest over Russell, while Kevin Magnussen and Liam Lawson (who suffered a brief spin in the Foro Sol in the opening half of the session) completed the top 10. Magnussen did not improve on his first effort with the softs having locked up at Turn 12, but a second attempt brought him into the top half of the field.

This was at Alex Albon’s expense, as the Anglo-Thai shook off his FP1 crash and the subsequent missing of FP2 to outpace team-mate Franco Colapinto by two tenths – the Williams split by Sauber’s Valtteri Bottas.