Here's the thing about Friday practice in Mexico City: Aston Martin honestly didn't expect to look this good. With its long straights and brutal altitude, this venue always threatens to expose a machine's weaknesses. But right now, the Silverstone squad and their power unit partner Honda have genuine reason to smile.
Fernando Alonso kicked things off by grabbing P7 in FP1. Sure, that time sheet was a bit scrambled by a raft of rookies and trouble for rival drivers, but a 1.229s gap to pacesetter Charles Leclerc gave an encouraging baseline. Then came FP2. While the veteran slipped back to P12 in the overall order, he actually tightened the screws on raw pace, trimming the margin down to just 0.769 to Leclerc. That is a massive step forward when you remember that earlier in the year, the deficit was counted in seconds. Overall, the AMR26 benchmarked as the seventh fastest car.
“Probably yes,” Alonso said when asked if the performance exceeded expectations. “I was very open-minded coming to the weekend because Mexico is such a unique place with altitude and things, that I thought maybe we have a good surprise. At the moment at least on my side of the garage, the car is working well. I think Lance's car has some issues that they need to check for tomorrow.”
The Spaniard brushed off concerns about running low downforce levels compared to previous events, noting that the beast felt remarkably similar to past years here. Down in the garage, Pedro de la Rosa pointed to the track's layout as a natural ally for the chassis, highlighting the abundance of slow-speed turns in the opening sector and the twisty final sequence.
“It's fair to say it's slightly better than expected,” de la Rosa noted, pointing out how the slow corners make the package look stronger. The power unit side also delivered a clean sheet, with Honda drawing praise for minimizing turbo lag at 2,200 metres of altitude, leaving cooling management as the main operational headache rather than power delivery.
Unfortunately, it wasn't plain sailing across the whole garage. Jak Crawford suffered a stoppage on track during FP1, and Lance Stroll spent his second session playing catch-up with car issues. But for Alonso's side of the pit wall, the opening day of the Mexican weekend was a genuinely beautiful surprise.
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