Verstappen wins in Mexico, Hamilton crowned champion!

Max Verstappen took the lead at the start of the Mexican Grand Prix and was able to hold on to that advantage all the way to the chequered flag to claim victory for Red Bull ahead of Ferrari's Sebastian Vettel.

Verstappen's second consecutive victory in Mexico means that Vettel's final chance of keeping the championship battle alive until Brazil has now slipped away.

Lewis Hamilton was duly handed his fifth world title despite finishing Sunday's race in fourth place behind Kimi Raikkonen, following a late retirement for polesitter Daniel Ricciardo with engine-related problems.

2018 Mexican Grand Prix - Race result

For the first time anywhere except Monaco, Daniel Ricciardo was the driver leading the field to the starting grid at the Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez, with his Red Bull team mate Max Verstappen alongside him in second place. One row back were the two title contenders Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel, and immediately in line behind them were their Mercedes and Ferrari 'wingmen', Valtteri Bottas and Kimi Raikkonen respectively.

With that combustible set-up, you could have got good odds on a chaotic start - but in fact everyone was fairly very well behaved when the lights went out. However Ricciardo did suffer from major wheel spin which allowed Hamilton to pop through the middle and challenge Verstappen for the lead.

The Dutch driver held firm, forcing Hamilton to back off and accept second rather than risk a race-ending collision. Ricciardo just managed to hold on to third while Bottas briefly moved ahead of Vettel only to be nerfed wide by light contact with Vettel going into turn 4, dropping him back to fifth ahead of Raikkonen and the Renaults of Carlos Sainz and Nico Hulkenberg.

It had been more eventful further back, with Esteban Ocon suffering damage to his front wing in an early skirmish with Hulkenberg. Debris flew off the Force India and hit Fernando Alonso's McLaren, which went off-track: although Alonso was initially able to continue, it was soon evident that the MCL33 had sustained more serious issues. He was eventually ordered to pull off the track on lap 5 and retire, which triggered a brief Virtual Safety Car while the car was recovered by track workers.

Ocon pitted for a new front wing at the end of the first lap, and Brendon Hartley also made an unscheduled early stop after flat-spotting his tyres. His Toro Rosso team mate Pierre Gasly was also in at the end of lap 6 to dump his odd starting choice of hypersoft tyres for a new set of rather more durable supersofts.

Tyre wear was already becoming an issue for the leaders despite their selection of ultras to start the race on. After ten laps, Verstappen had pulled out a 4.5s lead over Hamilton with Ricciardo on the cusp of DRS range in third followed by Vettel, Bottas, Raikkonen, Sainz and Hulkenberg, with the Saubers holding on to ninth and tenth ahead of local favourite Sergio Perez.

Mercedes were first of the leaders to pit at the end of lap 11, double stacking Hamilton and Bottas. They filtered back out in fifth and eighth respectively. Ricciardo responded a lap later, and Verstappen surrendered the lead next time after reporting that he was "really struggling".

That allowed Vettel and Raikkonen to stay out and take control of the race, but by now both Ferraris were also starting to struggle for grip. They were immediately put to the sword by a storming Verstappen getting a formidable tow in the slipstream. Hamilton made harder work of it, not managing to plot a course around Raikkonen until lap 16 when he came out best in a tough-but-fair scrap through turn 1 and the chicane, which also pulled Ricciardo through in his wake.

That was the signal for the Ferraris to pit, so that on lap 20 the running order consisted of Verstappen with a nine second lead over Hamilton, followed by Ricciardo, Vettel, Bottas, Raikkonen and the yet-to-stop Perez. Sainz and Hulkenberg had made their first pit stops and were now running on new supersofts in eighth and ninth, followed by Haas' Kevin Magnussen.

The race was barely a third done when Hamilton was reporting that his latest set of tyres were starting to suffer. "I'm struggling, man," he told the Mercedes pit wall, only to be told that new tyres were in short supply with only one fresh set of ultras was left in the garage - unlikely to see him through the remainder of the race from here. At least Hamilton wasn't alone, with Ricciardo also complaining of issues with his front-left tyre. That backed the Aussie up into DRS range of Vettel, who was getting increasingly desperate of making some forward progress if he was to keep his title hopes alive.

While Verstappen appeared unaffected by the tyre dramas going on behind him, the Red Bull pit wall was still anxious: "Look after your tyres, there's a lot of troubles behind," he was warned. "This is not going to be straightforward to the end Max, either one or two stops."

Battle was suspended on lap 30 when Carlos Sainz became the second retirement of the afternoon, the Renault abruptly locking up and forced to pull over in the stadium section as he was about to be lapped by the race leader. The Force India reacted by summoning Perez and Ocon in for their scheduled pit stops under the VSC, before racing resumed and Vettel renewed his assault on Ricciardo for third place. He finally pulled it off in the run through turn 1 at the start of lap 33, with Ricciardo fuming at backmarkers for getting in the way.

Halfway through the 71-lap race and the two-tier nature of this year's championship was laid bare with just six cars - Verstappen, Hamilton, Vettel, Ricciardo, Bottas and Raikkonen - on the lead lap, and everyone else having been passed by the race leader. Hulkenberg was leading the unofficial 'Class B' tournament but was being hunted down by Perez who had already dispatched Charles Leclerc, Kevin Magnussen and Stoffel Vandoorne.

Vettel had been slashing the gap to Hamilton and on lap 39 he lined up a move into turn 1 to find remarkably little resistance from the Mercedes, which was much more preoccupied with tyre wear. The overtake was cheered by the Mexican crowds, but these quickly turned to groans of despair as local hero Perez was forced to retire from the race moments later after suffering a brake failure in turn 1 that almost threw him off track. Things were little better for his team mate Ocon, who banged wheels with Hartley on lap 42. The Toro Rosso came off worse for the encounter in terms of bodywork damage, and with a five second penalty for causing a collision.

Verstappen's lead was up to 12 seconds despite Vettel's best efforts, the German driver needing nothing less than to win the race in order to keep him mathematically in the title hunt. Meanwhile Hamilton had fallen well behind and on lap 46 he outbraked himself under pressure from Ricciardo and ran off onto the grass, handing the Red Bull the final podium spot on a plate. Even so, fourth place would be more than enough to see Hamilton crowned champion regardless of anything Vettel did.

Declaring his tyres dead, Hamilton pitted next time by with Vettel having just made the same decision. Verstappen reacted to the Ferrari move and covered it off by coming in for new supersofts of his own, but he was still able to come back out in the lead with a five second advantage over Ricciardo. Vettel and Raikkonen were both now ahead of Hamilton, and Bottas had dropped to sixth place after replicating his team mate's run-off at turn 1 and then also pitting for fresh ultras to see him to the finish.

Ricciardo's valiant battle to fend off Vettel for second place came to an sad end on lap 62, when a stream of smoke from the back of the car signalled the RB14's demise for the eighth time in 2018. Another VSC was required while the Red Bull was recovered by the marshalls, with an anxious Verstappen on the team radio to ask his race engineer if there were any signs of problems on his own car: "Check my engine. If we need to turn it down, turn it down."

Despite these safeguards, Verstappen retained an impressive 17s lead at the front over Vettel, Raikkonen and Hamilton through the remaining laps. Only Bottas had taken the opportunity for a free pit stop under the VSC before the race resumed, taking a set of fresh hypers to finish the race on. This knocked him off the lead lap but he was still far ahead of Hulkenberg, Leclerc, Vandoorne, Ericsson and Gasly who picked up the remainder of the championship points on offer this week with Ocon just missing out in 11th.

Verstappen's win denied Vettel the points he needed to keep the title fight alive. Even if the Ferrari driver had won, Hamilton finishing in fourth would have sealed the title for the Briton anyway. However, for the second year running Hamilton had to celebrate his championship victory without an official place on the podium - but he made up with a few celebratory donuts in the stadium section to delight the fans.

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