Verstappen’s team-mate Sergio Perez missed much of the hour-long session after crashing on the Peraltada corner early on and breaking the rear wing – just like Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc did.
At the first race at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez there was a lot of dust when the cars swept the track and the drivers pointed out the restricted visibility on their team radios.
The teams were quite divided on their tire usage in the early stages – with the Mercedes cars using the soft compound and Red Bull sending its drivers into tough times – while other drivers drove the mid-range.
Kimi Räikkönen had led the field out of the box and set the benchmark for first place with 1: 30.060 minutes on the hards, which quickly fell significantly.
Mick Schumacher, Antonio Giovinazzi and Lando Norris all brought Raikkonen down as they were briefly in the lead on the medium, hard and soft tires before Bottas scored a time of 1: 21.327 minutes at the end of the first five minutes.
Perez then put Red Bull in the lead with 1: 21.301 minutes on the much harder surface, before Bottas responded shortly after with 1: 20.459 minutes.
After 10 minutes, Leclerc and Perez both crashed on the penultimate corner leaving the stadium section, with the session being interrupted by a virtual safety car activation to clear up the debris from their separate incidents.
Leclerc lost the rear of his SF21 when he touched the outer curb at the start of the Peraltada turn and turned it to the right, which meant it slipped backwards and at low speed and hit the guardrails and broke its rear wing endplates.
Perez had faster speed after turning off the curbs too, but when he caught his oversteer snapshot his RB16B snapped and the second time he went left and he spun quickly and tore his rear wing in the crash that followed half off.
Both drivers recovered in the pits, where their cars spent almost half of the session repairing.
Sergio Perez, Red Bull Racing RB16B
Photo by: Steven Tee / Motorsport Images
On the track, shortly after Pierre Gasly took first place on the softs after 15 minutes with 1: 20.316s, Hamilton had a right front lock in front of the first corner and went deep into the runoff and the grass behind corner 2.
He crossed the grass but did not go to the left of the bollard at the apex of Turn 2, as directed by race director Michael Masi, and so his actions will be investigated after FP1 is over.
After his off, Hamilton exchanged the best times at the top of the order with Verstappen – the Dutchman beat Gasly’s time with 1: 20.214s, while after 20 minutes he still used the hard times.
Hamilton, still on the softs, then scored a 1: 20.085s, to which Verstappen replied five minutes later with a 1: 19.826s and then the world champion stole back to the top with 1: 19.781s.
After a brief break around halfway through, all cars switched to the softs for a series of qualifying simulation runs (some returned to the hard in the final stages of FP1).
Carlos Sainz Jr was the fastest for Ferrari with 1: 19.470 minutes before Bottas returned to first place with his new softs with 1: 18.834 minutes.
After Perez and Leclerc returned to the track after repairs, Bottas started another run and set the fastest time of the session – a time of 1: 18.341 minutes.
With just over 10 minutes left, Hamilton shot into second place, 0.076 seconds slower than Bottas, while Verstappen slipped into third place, 0.123 seconds behind.
Perez worked his way up to fourth place at the end of the session, the local hero was still struggling visibly with oversteer in the final minutes, Gasly was fifth ahead of Sainz and Fernando Alonso.
Leclerc was eighth ahead of Esteban Ocon and Sebastian Vettel, who completed the top 10.
Raikkonen finished twelfth and is also being investigated by the commissioners because he could not avoid the bollard of Turn 2 on an excursion outside the track.
F1 Mexico GP – FP1 Results
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