When the mathematical permutations involving a Nico Rosberg world championship win were being worked out after his victory in Suzuka, we didn't believe the Mercedes AMG F1 driver would actually settle for four second place finishes in the final four races of the season. But after a lucky second place finish behind a dominant Lewis Hamilton in America and barely making it to the front row of the grid for the Mexico Grand Prix, we're thinking the German may have his work cut out for him. Especially when Hamilton is on the kind of form that earned him his tenth pole position of the season, a good 0.254 seconds ahead of his Mercedes teammate, with a lap of 1min. 18.704sec. around the 4.304km, 17-turn Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez in Mexico City.
Until very late in the session however, it was looking like Rosberg would have to manage whatever he could from the second row of the grid as Max Verstappen and Daniel Ricciardo had occupied the second and third spots on the grid.
Championship leader Rosberg left it right until the very end of the third segment of qualifying, however, to sneak ahead of Verstappen by just 0.096 seconds. Then second Red Bull Racing car of Ricciardo was just a further 0.079 seconds behind the Dutchman around a circuit where, due to the short length and many medium speed corners, the single-lap spreads are not very great.
Just 0.847 seconds covered the eight fastest qualifiers, which made Hamilton's gap to Rosberg seem all the more impressive.
Not in the least bit impressive, much to the dismay of their loyal fans, were Ferrari who could only manage sixth and seventh on the grid with Kimi Raikkonen yet again out-qualifying Sebastian Vettel, albeit by just 0.005 seconds.
The fabled Italian outfit has struggled for a large part of the season and have been left trailing Red Bull with no end to their misery in sight despite constantly bringing upgrades to its current car, and not just focusing on the 2017 overhaul of the technical regulations.
Both Ferraris were beaten by the Force India-Mercedes of an in-form Nico Hulkenberg who claimed fifth position, just 0.046 seconds ahead of Raikkonen. It was a particularly strong qualifying for Hulkenberg who easily out-qualified his Mexcian teammate Sergio Perez, who could do no better than 12th and was knocked out in the second segment of qualifying.
The Williams-Mercedes of Valtteri Bottas and Felipe Massa were eighth and ninth and Toro Rosso-Ferrari's Carlos Sainz completed the top ten.
It was a particularly bad qualifying session for Sainz's teammate Daniil Kvyat who was just 18th and also for Haas-Ferrari's Romain Grosjean who qualified dead last in 21st after missing a chance to improve on account of teammate Esteban Gutierrez spinning out during the Frenchman's hot lap, forcing him to abort it.
Jolyon Palmer didn't take part in qualifying at all after a crack was found in the monocoque tub of his factory Renault.
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