Everything that happened in second Mexican GP F1 practice

Lando Norris replaced Alex Albon as Red Bull’s nearest challenger, as Max Verstappen continued to set the pace in second practice for the 2023 Mexican Grand Prix.

Key moments

• McLaren up to second
• Perez only fifth
• Albon slips out of top 10

Verstappen found over a second compared to FP1, ending Friday with a 1m18.686s best that was enough to eclipse McLaren driver Norris by 0.119 seconds.

Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc was third quickest, within two tenths of Verstappen’s pace, while Valtteri Bottas - who qualified inside the top six here last year - vaulted Alfa Romeo into the top four after resuming command of the car he handed to Theo Pourchaire for FP1.

Sergio Perez was the last driver to lap below 1m19s in this session, ending it just fractionally over three tenths adrift of Verstappen’s pace in fifth.

Daniel Ricciardo continued his strong start to this weekend with the sixth fastest time for AlphaTauri, only 0.014s slower than Perez’s Red Bull and less than a tenth ahead of both Lewis Hamilton’s Mercedes and Esteban Ocon’s Alpine.

Oscar Piastri was the first to fit soft tyres for the qualifying simulations. He was briefly fastest with a 1m19.163s lap, but his McLaren slipped to ninth as others gained time.

George Russell rounded out the top 10 after taking back his Mercedes from Frederik Vesti, ahead of Carlos Sainz’s Ferrari, Yuki Tsunoda’s AlphaTauri and Zhou Guanyu’s Alfa Romeo.

Having surprised his own team by setting the second fastest time for Williams in FP1, Albon was only 14th in FP2 - seven tenths off the pace, though almost half a second quicker than his team-mate Logan Sargeant.

Aston Martin endured a difficult session. Lance Stroll set the 18th quickest time before becoming stranded in the pits with a stuck left front wheel, while Fernando Alonso suffered a high-speed 360-degree spin through the esses and was slowest of all 20 runners, more than 1.7s off the pace.