The first practice session in Mexico featured a lot of Friday drivers, including Giovinazzi, Leclerc, Gelael and Antonio Celis, who was driving in front of his home crowd. Unfortunately, he spun his Force India and hit the barriers, causing a red flag whilst the incident was sorted out. Stoffel Vandoorne only managed three laps due to an engine problem, Verstappen spent much of his morning in the garage, and Brendon Hartley stopped out on track, before getting going again only to disappear in the garage.

In FP2, it was all about spins, with Hamilton, Hartley and Stroll all facing the wrong way. Romain Grosjean had a significant spin and then suffered a puncture, which spread debris all over the track and caused a red flag. Verstappen halted his running with engine trouble, whilst Sebastian Vettel had an unsettling moment when an extinguisher burst and was leaking into his seat.

In terms of pace, Bottas was fastest in the morning, whilst Ricciardo posted the fastest lap of the track ever for FP2, but the top ten were all within one second of each other.

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