Max Verstappen crossed the thin white line of his genius in a chaotic, bitter and potentially dangerous Mexico City Grand Prix that saw his world championship lead over Lando Norris cut by his own hand. And, suddenly, the title fight is alive and kicking.
Never a man to walk away from motor racing’s equivalent of a bar-room brawl, Verstappen was unlikely to yield to his pal, McLaren’s British driver who only a few days earlier had admitted he could not live with such a talent.
In astonishing scenes, Verstappen was handed two separate 10-second penalties within minutes of each other for his pugilism at Turns Four and Eight in trying to resist Norris’s papaya car as it tried to pass him on lap 10 of 71.
The upshot at the end of this dramatic race was second place for Norris, who passed Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc with nine laps left, and sixth for Verstappen.
That trims the defending champion’s lead to 47 points with 120 still on offer heading to Sao Paulo, Brazil on Sunday, after which three rounds will remain.
While focus centres on the title fight and the skirmish that spilled over on this cloudy afternoon, we must take our sombreros off to Ferrari’s Carlos Sainz, a brilliant winner from pole.
Carlos Sainz claimed his second win of the season in a breathless Mexico City Grand Prix
Lando Norris had to settle for second but slashed Max Verstappen’s lead to 47 points
The Dutchman had to serve two 10-second time penalties for some aggressive defensive work
The 900-yard drag into the first corner was always going to fall under the microscope after the drama of last week’s opening corner in Austin.
There, Norris started on pole yet granted Verstappen unfathomable space on the inside.
The Dutchman doesn’t require a welcome mat. He went straight through the front door without knocking and finished third to Norris’s fourth. That was the context to all that was to unfold.
Verstappen was very quickly away from second on the grid and soon side-by-side with Sainz. He reached the first corner ahead but ran wide as he tried to turn. Sainz, on his outside, went over the grass and re-emerged ahead. But he gave the place back.
The close dancing was a sign of things to come. Before we got there, theatre in the middle of the starting pack.
RB’s Yuki Tsunoda charged down the inside, his back wheel interlocking with the front of Alex Albon’s Williams. Tsunoda’s rear right went rolling away. His RB was partly airborne and ended up the wrong way around in the barrier. The safety car was summoned. Tsunoda and Albon were out, though both uninjured.
After a six-lap interlude, the safety car withdrew. Verstappen ground to a crawl before launching himself effectively away. A smart restart that left Sainz unable to pounce. Norris remained where he had started — in third.
It was a good day for Mercedes as Lewis Hamilton came fourth and George Russell took fifth
Norris accused Verstappen of ‘dangerous’ driving after he made contact with him twice
The Dutch Red Bull driver faced pressure from Norris with the pair clashing during the race
Seconds later, the rivals resumed their bitter fight and, taking advantage of the commotion, Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc nipped in to make it a team one-two with Sainz
Verstappen then radioed his support team: ‘Mate what can I do with a empty battery? What is this stupid mode?’
Sainz harried Verstappen and managed to wriggle into the lead at the start of lap nine. Lo and behold, that put Verstappen and Norris back together, in second and third. The scene was now set.
It was surely only a matter of time before they went nose-to-nose. Norris pressed his case on the outside of Turn Four but Verstappen pushed him wide. Norris ran off over the grass and came back in front of the Red Bull.
The McLaren man tried to hand the place back at Turn Eight — learning from last week when he failed to do so in the closing stages — but Verstappen took a seemingly retaliatory dart and detoured off the road, squeezing Norris. With nowhere to go, he also went off. The radio lit up.
Of the Turn Four wrangle, Norris said: ‘This guy is dangerous. It’s the same as last time. I’ll be in the wall in a minute. I was ahead the whole way through the corner.’
And of the Turn Eight imbroglio: ‘There has to be a penalty for Max, or he must give the place back.’
The stewards investigated, though not for long. They issued Verstappen a 10-second penalty for ‘forcing another driver off the track’ at Turn Four — twice Norris’s punishment for overtaking outside the white lines in Texas last weekend.
‘Ten!?’ exclaimed Verstappen. ‘That’s quite impressive.’ His race engineer Gianpiero ‘GP’ Lambiase replied: ‘There was a lot of whinging. A lot.’
Ferrari had both drivers on the podium as Sainz won and Charles Leclerc claimed third
Haas brought home a nice haul, with Kevin Magnussen in seventh and Nico Hulkenberg ninth
But that was not the end of it. A few minutes later Verstappen was handed a second 10-second penalty for the Turn Eight incident — ‘leaving the track and gaining an advantage’. Both were to be served at his pit stop.
‘Wow,’ said George Russell when informed of the adjudication.
Verstappen pitted on lap 26. He drove in lying third and came out in 15th place, 41sec behind Norris. When the Englishman later stopped, the margin was 17.6sec.
Verstappen was always going to make progress through the relative deadwood ahead of him, but he was never going to make an impression at the front again.
Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez is a roasting crucible that invites pressure. Nowhere is more jumping, dancing or hollering than inside Foro Sol, the old baseball stadium through which the circuit runs. Amid the 30,000-throng were plenty of red shirts but the Ferrari fans were outdone in number and noise by the Sergio Perez partisans.
On Saturday, his qualifying performance was brief, as he went out in Q1. Pressure is mounting on Perez at Red Bull. He is 34 and suffering a crisis of confidence.
Pressure is mounting on Sergio Perez after he qualified 18th and could only rise to 17th
This was Sainz’s first win since March and it helps Ferrari in the tight battle for second
He is contracted for next year, but almost certainly will not see it out. He is, I understand, likely to be guiding gently to the exit door and to as dignified a retirement as choreography will permit.
Cheered to the echo on the grid he zoomed up to 13th. Suddenly, it all looked a little rosier for the poor chap, but he had started out of his pit box. A five-second penalty stalled his progress. He finished a dismal 17th.
Lewis Hamilton has been short of his peak in this his last year at Mercedes, but he won his long tussle with team-mate Russell to finish a place ahead of him in fourth, behind Leclerc in third.
