Max Verstappen, Red Bull, Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez, 2025

Max Verstappen admitted he expected more of his rivals to use the same strategy as his Red Bull team did in the Mexican Grand Prix.

Red Bull’s drivers were the only ones inside the top 10 to start the race on the medium tyre compound. That allowed Verstappen to delay his first pit stop until he could switch to soft tyres for a final stint at the end of the race. Many of those who started the race on softs had to make a second pit stop, which dropped them behind Verstappen.

After the race, Verstappen said he gave no thought to starting on the soft tyres and was surprised so many others did. “I was very surprised,” he admitted.

“I didn’t expect to be on the podium. And I think even in the first stint, it was not really looking like it. At the time, I thought we were just slow and struggling on tyres.

“When we swapped to the softs and the others were on mediums, it all looked a bit more competitive. Still not to the level of Lando [Norris], if you take the average of the race, but the soft definitely was a better compound to race on, and it all felt a bit better.

“So I think overall to be [third] has been really good for us [on] a difficult weekend.”

Verstappen had to cope with a lack of grip early in the race when he was on harder tyres than those around him. “Very quickly I could see that the grip was just not there, and I was really struggling actually to just follow the cars ahead of me.”

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He went off at the start of the race when he arrived at the first corner alongside Norris and the two Ferrari drivers. Verstappen said he had to run wide after his car bottomed out on the kerb leading to the corner.

“I had a very good start. Then you just follow the slipstream – three-wide, four-wide – just following what the car next to you is doing.

“So I had to move left, left, left and then at one point, of course, you’re on the kerb and then I started bottoming out on the kerb. So that was quite hectic and then a bit of rallying in between turns one and two. That was quite fun.

“Then I got back onto the track, found my position again. The first few laps were a bit hectic.”

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2025 Mexican Grand Prix

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