Verstappen shades Albon for Mexican GP practice hat-trick

Max Verstappen set the pace in third and final practice for the Mexico City Grand Prix to complete a practice hat-trick heading into qualifying.

On his second attempt on a new set of Softs, Verstappen pumped in a 1:17.887, despite traffic, to shade Alex Albon by just 0.070s in an impressive performance from the Williams driver who managed to split the Red Bulls with Sergio Perez third.

George Russell took fourth for Mercedes with Lewis Hamilton 10th as Ferrari's Soft tyre runs late on ended with Charles Leclerc encountering traffic and Carlos Sainz spinning.

Qualifying at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodgriguez gets underway at 15:00pm local time, 22:00 in the UK.

Russell fastest to start

In dusty, hot conditions in Mexico, Valtteri Bottas was the first driver to venture out, on the Hard Pirellis, with Leclerc quickly assuming the top spot on a set of Softs before Lewis Hamilton and then George Russell took over the fastest time.

Russell clocked in a 1:18.644 to gap Hamilton by over half-a-second as triple World Champion Verstappen waited nearly 20 minutes to venture out for the first time in the session.

His first attempt on the C5 tyre was a 1:18.717 to slot in behind Russell, but on a subsequent lap, the Red Bull went quickest by 0.215s to top the session at the half-way mark as drivers began to regroup for the final low fuel runs.

Albon pumped in a 1:17.957 to vault to the top of the times with Verstappen only able to go 0.070s faster than that in the benchmark time of a 1:17.887 to top the session.

Perez was 0.139s down on his team-mate, having lost time through Sectors 2 and 3 having gone purple in Sector 1.

Russell was fourth ahead of Oscar Piastri, Valtteri Bottas, Yuki Tsunoda, Lando Norris, Daniel Ricciardo and Hamilton - who was informed most of the time loss to Russell was coming in Turns 4 and 5.

Ferrari struggle

Having waited until near the end to complete their final laps, both Ferraris ran into trouble.

Leclerc came across a dawdling Magnussen - who lost a lot of time in the pits with a wheel issue - in the high-speed sweeps, forcing him to abandon the lap and end 13th fastest as Sainz spun when passing Fernando Alonso's Aston Martin seconds later.

He ended 15th, behind Lance Stroll in 14th with Logan Sargeant and Zhou Guanyu 11th and 12th, respectively.

Nico Hulkenberg took 16th for Haas ahead of Alonso with Pierre Gasly 18th, Magnussen 19th and Esteban Ocon last of all for Alpine on what has been a difficult weekend.