It came a week too late to save his championship, but at least a fine win for Nico Rosberg in the Mexican GP boosted his confidence when he needed it most. The Mercedes driver won fair and square, taking pole position for the fourth race in succession but, on this occasion, converting it to a win, his fourth of the season and the first in four months.
The key to the result was the start and the first corner, a crucial stage of the race in which Rosberg had habitually lost out to his team-mate and three-time world champion, Lewis Hamilton. This time, Rosberg gave Hamilton no room to pull off an overtaking move and took command of F1’s return to Mexico.
The revised Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez retained much of its former character and atmosphere but the new surface was slippery and did not allow much opportunity for on-the-limit overtaking moves. In fact, there were more collisions and spins than clean passes, the first example being a critical one since it involved Sebastian Vettel’s Ferrari, the one combination that seemed capable of taking the fight to Mercedes.
In the scramble through the first corner, Vettel cut across the Red Bull of Daniel Ricciardo and received a rear puncture for his trouble. It was to be the start of a poor race for the former champion as he spun more than once and eventually crashed out. That would end a disastrous race for Ferrari, Kimi Raikkonen having also retired when he collided for the second time in three races with the Williams of fellow-countryman Valtteri Bottas. In a reverse of what happened when these two came together in Russia, it was Raikkonen who came off worst and contributed to Ferrari not finishing either car in a race for the first time in almost 10 years.
Bottas continued and made the most of a late safety car restart (after Vettel’s final accident) to use the superior power of the Williams-Mercedes to overhaul the Renault-powered Red Bull of Daniil Kvyat on the long main straight and take third place.
Rosberg was delighted with his win but Hamilton, competitive as he is and clearly not happy about finishing second, initially ignored a call by Mercedes to bring in both cars to change tyres with a quarter of the race to run. The world champion questioned the decision, only to be told it was for “safety reasons” because the first set of tyres were “down to the canvas”. Hamilton, who appeared not to believe what he was being told by his engineer, responded: “The tyres feel fine.” The call to come in was repeated, with the terse words: “This an instruction.” Hamilton duly obeyed but continued to express his displeasure. The appearance of the safety car not long after gave Hamilton the chance to close up and attack Rosberg, but the German had him covered and pulled away.
It was not an epic race but that mattered little to a hugely enthusiastic 134 000 crowd who cheered very move by local hero Sergio Perez. The Force India driver, wrong-footed by the safety car as he tried to make a one-stop race work, missed the chance to change tyres and did well to hang on to eighth place, holding off faster cars to the end of 71 laps.
It was the first time F1 had been back in Mexico since 1992, a return as welcome as Rosberg’s win.