Friday in Mexico brought a genuinely encouraging start for Mercedes, with George Russell claiming third and Kimi Antonelli slotting in right behind him in fourth during the afternoon session. As Motorsport.com Italia reports, the Brackley squad found themselves right in the thick of the leading group, though a tightly packed field means the exact pecking order remains anyone's guess for now.
For Antonelli, the day required fighting back from a rough start. After an viral infection forced him to miss media duties on Thursday, Kimi proved he was fully recovered by jumping back into the cockpit and showing his usual energy, a return confirmed by Deputy Team Principal Bradley Lord. But FP1 was far from straightforward, as the W17 struggled initially with its balance on an evolving track, forcing the Italian and his engineers to completely overhaul their setup choices. Even with those early headaches, Antonelli still managed a strong second in the morning session, finishing ahead of Frederik Vesti.
Switching to different setups between sessions unlocked a much better operating window for the afternoon. Antonelli wound up just 111 milliseconds off his teammate Russell and 217 milliseconds shy of Charles Leclerc's benchmark. Still, the young Italian insisted there is plenty of homework left for the overnight hours to extract more pace from the car.
Meanwhile, Russell had to sit out the morning running to hand his machine over to Vesti. The Danish driver made the most of the opportunity, completing the team's program and putting up the third-fastest time overall while leading the rookie contingent. Russell jumped straight into the fray for FP2 and quickly found his rhythm, though he faced the unique torture of the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez. Between the high altitude, thin air, and tricky turbo lag, the 2026 aerodynamic demands added an extra layer of difficulty, stripping away the usual high-downforce boost teams typically rely on for this venue.
Trackside engineering director Andrew Shovlin pointed out that while the power unit behaved well and cooling systems survived the brutal demands of the circuit, the W17's cornering behavior remains a headache. The car suffers from instability on entry followed by understeer at the apex, a flaw that crops up on both qualifying sims and long runs alike. Mercedes is clearly right on the edge of the fight, but with the top teams separated by razor-thin margins, unlocking a front-row starting spot will demand perfection when qualifying rolls around.
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