REPORT: Split Fortunes in Mexico City Quali

It will be a P12 and P17 start for Atlassian Williams Racing for the Mexico City Grand Prix in a typically tight 2025 qualifying session.

Carlos Sainz fared better than Alex Albon around the Mexican capital, reaching Q3 after Alex exited in Q1, but will lose five positions after his penalty from Austin.

We'll be looking at every opportunity to return to point-scoring Sunday form tomorrow after our four-race run of top-10 finishes ended in America.

While Carlos set a 1:17.032 in Q1 on his second run to end the session in P11, it wasn't so straightforward for Alex.

Our No23 suffered lock-ups in FP3, and his braking concerns continued into qualifying as he couldn't improve on a third push lap with fresh Pirellis.

Alex's second effort of 1:17.490 was his best time, but sadly not enough for Q2.

In Q2, Carlos showed the speed that earned him victory in last year's race, sitting P3 after his first lap, and eventually ended the 15 minutes in P5 with a 1:16.607.

Q3 began with Carlos setting a 1:16.990 to sit P8 at the front of all of our upper-midfield peers.

Another improvement followed in the final moments of qualifying, with a 1:16.172 that was faster than the championship leader to end the session in P7 before the five-place penalty kicked in.

"Great job, Carlos," came James Vowles' congratulations over the radio. "Really, really impressive. Out-qualified a McLaren as well. Well done."

Carlos replied, "Thank you, James. That's one of my best ones. I'm so very happy with that."

"That was probably my best qualifying lap of the season," Carlos shared post-Q3.

"I’m enjoying the feeling in the car and today we executed a very solid qualifying. We’ll take the positives and refocus on tomorrow. It’s a shame we have to serve that penalty as it will definitely make our race tougher with the dirty air and the cooling.

"However, I have confidence in my race pace and we’ll do all we can to fight back into the points. I also want to say thank you to the fans here; their support is truly something special and it’s incredible to drive around this circuit listening to all their cheers! Alex reflected on his afternoon by adding: "The conditions were very different between sessions, and I had a lot less grip in qualifying than in FP3. We’ve been chasing the feel of the car all weekend, never feeling totally comfortable or hitting our stride.

"I felt like the track got away from me in qualifying and we were sliding around a lot today, I never really found the grip that I needed. We fixed some things ahead of qualifying, but were also dealing with a potential issue with the brakes, so there’s a lot to analyse and debrief as a team to see what we can do to improve.

"It’s usually one-stop racing here in Mexico so we’ll see what happens tomorrow and hopefully we can finish the weekend stronger than we started."

Wrapping up our Saturday reaction, James Vowles shared: "What a fantastic lap from Carlos to qualify P7 on the grid and ahead of a McLaren, which is an extraordinary effort. Well done.

"With Alex, there is great performance in him, which we’ve seen across the session. However, for whatever reason, during our last run in qualifying, we didn’t have the grip in the tyres and couldn’t get them working.

"I'm confident we'll see Alex back tomorrow fighting in the front and taking advantage of the long opening straight from where we are starting on the grid.

"Looking ahead to the race, it's the longest run down to turn one of any circuit of the season, so it always creates good opportunities and some fireworks."