Red Bull’s Max Verstappen celebrates his third straight Mexico City Grand Prix win and extended his championship lead over Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton. PHOTO: Red Bull content pool

BRENDAN LINES November 8, 2021

RED Bull’s Max Verstappen overcame Mercedes’ front-row lockout and breezed to a third Mexico City Grand Prix win on Sunday.

Verstappen and teammate — hometown hero Sergio Perez — pulled off perfect pincer move applying pressure on championship rival Lewis Hamilton after a chaotic first lap.

Hamilton was left stranded between the Red Bull cars after teammate Valtteri Bottas’ shock pole position was short-lived when the Finn was spun around after a contact with Daniel Ricciardo’s McLaren at Turn one.

The Dutchman flew out of the blocks on the race restart on Lap five after the safety-car period and pulled away in the clean air.

Hamilton conceded “these guys are obviously too fast for us “ over team radio in opening phase of the race and was losing time to Verstappen, while falling into the clutches of Perez.

Mercedes pitted the Brit on lap 30 for hard tyres, but Hamilton emerged from the pitlane and slotted behind the Ferrari of Charles Leclerc. While Verstappen was happily pumping in fastest lap times and put a nine-second gap between himself and Hamilton.

Perez played the team game, closing down the gap on Hamilton’s P2 to just one-second, a final lunge on Hamilton in the closing laps had the home crowd on their feet in the hope Perez would complete a Red Bull 1-2 — but P3 was enough to put smiles on the faces of the Mexican’s adoring fans.

Alpha Tauri’s Pierre Gasly drove a workman-like P4, comfortably gaining one place overall when Bottas spun.

In the battle for third in the constructors championship, Ferrari swung the momentum its way with a 13.5 point lead over McLaren when Charles Leclerc (P5) and Carlos SainZ (P6) swapped back and forth over who was fastest after conceding to Gasly’s P4.

McLaren’s day hardly went to plan after Ricciardo’s contact with Bottas put the Australian down the order to finish in P12, while teammate Lando Norris recovered to take the last championship point on offer after receiving a grid penalty.

Verstappen’s win makes it three wins in a row and extends his championship lead to 19 points over Hamilton.