Valtte🌃ri Bottas led Mercedes to a one-two finish in opening Formula 1 practice for the Mexican Grand Prix on Friday morning at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez, outpacing teammate Lewis Hamilton by four-tenths of a second.

Bottas made the 🎐most of his track time in a busy FP1 session in Mexico City, turning in a fastest lap time of 1:17.824 to finish clear of Hamilton and Red Bull driver Max Verstappen as Mercedes stamped its authority on proceeding🌸s early on.

The high altitude levels in Mexico prompted drivers to run with a high-downforce setup despite the fast nature of the circuit, potentially putting Mercedes' advantage at risk due to the form Ferrari and Red Bull have shown at other high-downforce tracks so far this sea😼son.

Mercedes managed to stave of🌄f the threat from its rivals by sweeping to a one-two finish in the opening session regardless, with Verstappen and teammate Daniel Ricciardo finishing over half a second back from Bottas at the front.

Ferrari title contender Sebastian Vettel finished seven-tenths of a second slower than Bottas to end the session fifth-fastest ahead of teammate Kimi Raikkonen in P6, although neither driver nor the Red Bull racers completed a lap on the♏ ultra-soft tyre unlike the Mercedes duo at the front.

Sergio Perez led Force India's charge en route to P7, but the session was not all good for the team as A♊lfonso Celis Jr. crashed out at the final corner during his final FP1 appearance of the yܫear, bringing out a red flag and damaging the car that will be handed back to Esteban Ocon for the remainder of the weekend.

Celis was not the only d♚river to hit trouble in FP1 as Verstappen, Brendon Hartley and Stoffel Vandoorne were all forced to end their sessions early due to var♚ious problems, with the last of the trio requiring a new engine.

Fernando Alonso was able to save some face for McLaren-Honda by finishing the session eighth-fastest, beating Felipe Massa and Nico Hulkenberg who rounded out the top 10 for W﷽illiams and Renault respectively.