Mexico City GP 2025: Norris wins by 30s and takes title lead

Lando Norris won the Mexico City Grand Prix from pole position on 26 October, crossing the line 30.324 seconds ahead of Charles Leclerc at the Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez. Max Verstappen was third, less than a second behind the Ferrari. The result put Norris back on top of the championship, one point clear of his McLaren team-mate Oscar Piastri, who finished fifth.

How Norris won in Mexico City

The work was done on Saturday. Norris's 1:15.586 was 0.262 seconds quicker than Leclerc, with Lewis Hamilton third in the other Ferrari. Leclerc got ahead into the first corner at the start but cut the corner and handed the place back. After that, nobody got close to Norris. His winning margin was the biggest in F1 since Verstappen's victory in Hungary in 2023.

Verstappen's afternoon was busier. He started fifth on mediums, ran wide at Turn 1, touched Hamilton while passing him on lap 6 and was soon complaining about a lack of grip. The switch to softs on lap 37 changed his race. Norris and Leclerc were both on mediums to the finish, and Verstappen was closing on the Ferrari when Carlos Sainz stopped his Williams in the stadium section on the penultimate lap. The Virtual Safety Car froze the order.

Sainz's race had gone wrong from the start. Contact with Liam Lawson on the opening lap left the Racing Bulls driver with damage that ended his race, and Sainz later collected two penalties for speeding in the pit lane. Oliver Bearman had the opposite kind of day. His fourth place equals the best result in Haas history, set by Romain Grosjean in Austria in 2018, and he kept Piastri behind him to the flag. Esteban Ocon was ninth, which lifted Haas above Sauber into eighth in the constructors' standings.

The teammate duels in Mexico

McLaren. Piastri qualified eighth, almost six tenths slower than Norris, and started seventh. He dropped to 11th on the first lap and spent the race recovering, reaching fifth on lap 60. In their head-to-head, Norris now leads 11–9 in qualifying and 11–8 in races on F1 Duels. A year that began with Piastri in control of this pairing has turned.

Ferrari. Third on the grid was Hamilton's best qualifying since joining Ferrari, and he spent the early laps fighting Verstappen. He left the track and gained an advantage in that fight, took a 10-second penalty, served it at his stop on lap 36 and came back from 14th to eighth. Leclerc won both halves of the duel and leads Hamilton vs Leclerc 15–3 in races in our count.

Mercedes. George Russell qualified fourth, 0.084 seconds ahead of Kimi Antonelli. In the race Antonelli ran in front until Russell asked to be let through, and Mercedes swapped them on lap 41 on the understanding that Russell would give the place back if he made no progress. He handed sixth back on lap 63. It is Antonelli's first Sunday win over Russell this season: their duel now reads 15–1 in races and 18–2 in qualifying for Russell.

What it means for the title

Norris has 357 points to Piastri's 356, with Verstappen on 321 and four rounds left. Norris lost the lead in Saudi Arabia in April and needed 189 days to get it back. It was his sixth win of 2025, one fewer than Piastri. Leclerc's second place also moved Ferrari back above Mercedes into second in the constructors' championship. Every verdict from the weekend is on the Mexico City GP duels page.