Verstappen was “on the edge” for braking in 'crucial' F1 start

Starting from third on the grid, Verstappen made the most of the slipstream effect to get alongside Mercedes pair Valtteri Bottas and Lewis Hamilton.

On the racing line, Verstappen braked incredibly late to swoop around the outside of his two rivals to take the lead of the race.

The Dutchman controlled the pace from then on to ultimately take a comfortable victory in Mexico, over 16 seconds clear of F1 title rival Hamilton.

Reflecting on his ‘crucial’ start, Verstappen said: “What stood out was clearly the start, three wide going into Turn 1, it’s quite typical of this track but exciting.

“You have to be precise, because speeds are high, braking into Turn 1 after the start, tyres are cold, brakes are cold going into that corner.

“But it was crucial for me to get ahead there and I could do my own pace from there onwards.”

Explaining the opening lap further, Verstappen was confident of where he was going to brake into Turn 1 once he was on the racing line going into the opening sequence of corners.

“I mean of course you can’t really practice how a start is going to go, right, as you end up left, middle, right, depends what happens,” Verstappen added.

“But once I was on the outside and on the racing line I knew exactly where I was going to brake.

“It’s always a tricky one, especially as the car on the inside is fully onto the dirt as nobody is really driving there so they can never brake as much as the car on the outside.

“Also because of the angle going into the corner, and I knew where I was braking was on the edge as I was getting quite close to the white line on the exit. I knew if somebody would brake later on the inside he would have definitely gone off the track so I went for it and it worked.”