BBC Radio 5 live

Fashion designer Tommy Hilfiger is in Mexico and tells BBC Radio 5 live: "I've been a Formula 1 fan for many, many years, we used to sponsor Team Lotus and then Ferrari, this it the ultimate with Lewis and Mercedes.

"Lewis and I are personal friends and I think he has great style so I said we had to do something together. We came together to create a whole brand and it has been nothing short of phenomenal.

"Lewis is dedicated, passionate, transparent, he is one of a kind. He will jump off a plane from South East Asia and come in at 8am and work all day. He is multi-talented - if you hear his music, his dreams of what he is doing in the future and his love of life."

Asked if Hamilton is going to win the title today, Hilfiger says: "We're minutes away, it's going to happen."

Hayley Morris: Favourite Hamilton moment? Silverstone 2006 watching him come from last to win the GP2 race on the morning of the British GP. Worst? Insinuating his poor reliability in 2016 may have been deliberate to favour Rosberg. As Senna was before him, a flawed genius. #bbcf1, external

Eric Johnson: Dear Mr Hamilton, Please consider the risks of doing a "Vettel" when passing #bbcf1, external

Tom Quick: Genuinely intrigued with what today's race holds... It's races with an unpredictable qualy that make us f1 fans love this sport.

Andrew Benson
BBC Sport’s chief F1 writer

Strategy? Well, there’s a question. Unusually this season, Pirelli say the theoretical quickest race is a two-stop, starting on the ultra-softs, as all the top six are, for about nine laps and then doing two stints on the super-soft. But of the drivers in the top teams, only Max Verstappen has two sets of new super-softs. The others only have one.

But the teams don’t agree with Pirelli’s assessment - they hardly ever do, to be frank. They are expecting the super-softs to be able to easily complete the race, whether the driver starts on hypers or ultras. So, looks like a one-stop, then, especially as overtaking is difficult once the race gets under way.

BBC Radio 5 live

Toro Rosso's Brendon Hartley, who starts 14th, says: "I'm feeling good. You always have some butterflies in the stomach but I'm feeling good, I'm trying to get angry."

Andrew Benson
BBC Sport’s chief F1 writer

Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff has admitted that he is worried about what could happen at the start. “The grid has the potential for carnage on the straight and through the first corners,” Wolff said. “You have the two Red Bulls, which have the least straight-line speed, on the front row. Then it's us, and then the Ferraris are obviously almost 10km/h up on everybody else. I try to visualise how that could look down the straight and through the first corner, and I just hope we come out with two cars intact.”

Lewis Hamilton said he would play it by ear: “It really depends what position I'm in. If I get a good tow and there's an opportunity to overtake, I'm going to take it. If there's not, then I'm going to try and hold position. I've been racing a long, long time, so it's very rare that I make rash decisions and silly decisions when it comes to those scenarios.”

Image source, Getty Images

This is what the front of the grid looks like, and they're all starting on ultrasofts.

There's something strange about the way this grid is laid out with the top three teams.

The charging bulls are at the front, the title rivals are on the second row, and then it's the two unofficial domestiques behind.

So that first corner is going to be interesting ...

Image source, BBC Radio 5 live

National anthem time, and 15 minutes to go until the race starts... shall we talk strategy?

Andrew Benson
BBC Sport’s chief F1 writer

Things are all getting a bit tasty down at Toro Rosso. Brendon Hartley, under pressure of potentially losing his seat next year, has questioned the team’s claim that team-mate Pierre Gasly had damage to his car at the US Grand Prix, where the New Zealander beat him. Both Gasly and the team are insistent that his car was damaged in the first-lap melee and Hartley is now saying he “can’t comment” any further. Hartley knows he has to up his game from earlier in the year to have any chance of keeping his seat, and has been insistent for some time that he has been better than he has looked this year because of certain circumstances that did not play in his favour.

So it was a good weekend to be competitive - which he has been. But a bad one to make a mistake when it mattered in second qualifying - which he did, costing himself a chance of a top 10 slot, and lining up 14th instead. Hartley did a mea culpa on Twitter: “I could give some lame excuses but ultimately it was a mistake in the last sector which cost us the chance to go through to Q3.” But clearly this is not a happy camp. Briton Alexander Albon, a race-winner in Formula Two, is the current name being linked to the seat alongside the returning Daniil Kvyat next season, even though he has a contract to race in Formula E with Nissan.

Image source, Getty Images

BBC Radio 5 live

McLaren's Stoffel Vandoorne, who starts 15th, tells BBC Radio 5 live: "There are a lot of opportunities, it is a bit of an unknown what will happen so you have to have a good launch and a bit of luck.

"It is pretty amazing here with so many people here in the grandstands cheering like crazy so hopefully we can give them a good race."

Maybe my editor will get the champagne out if I do a good job of this live text...

Image source, Getty Images

Paul O'Kelly: Best. 2008 Brazilian Gp winning title at last corner. Worst. After the 2011 Monaco gp when he decided to quote Ali G.

Richard Gransden: Best - British GP 2008.

Tanja: There‘s no worst Memory! The worst memory will be, when he retires one day. And even than, he‘ll decide it because he wants to and we are behind him! #TeamLH

Chris Hewson: What's the chances that vettel or his team mate deliberately takes out Hamilton and then goes on to win the race?? Remember the Schumacher and Damon hill days..

BBC Radio 5 live

Red Bull team principal Christian Horner tells BBC Radio 5 live: "We've had a good talk this morning and spoken about the objectives of the team and that is to win this race and get both cars home in the positions they are in.

"In a drag race that is not our strongest asset so it going to be crucial to get a good getaway. Daniel (Ricciardo) is feeding off the energy of the crowd and really up for this."

Andrew Benson
BBC Sport’s chief F1 writer

As always, the battle for best of the rest is going to be intense. And not for the first time this year, the drivers from the midfield teams who made it into the top 10 may be at a disadvantage to those just outside it. That’s because the two Renaults and two Saubers have to start on the hyper-soft tyres, which in practice were going off after just three laps, and those from 11th, who have free tyre choice.

Force India sacrificed grid position to avoid the hyper-softs in the race, and Esteban Ocon has the theoretical pound seat in 11th place. But races and tyres don’t always run as expected. In Singapore, Fernando Alonso - 12th today and hopeful of points as a result - used the outside-top-10 strategy to great effect to finish seventh. But in Russia, the top 10 qualifiers stayed pretty much where they were. How will it play out this time around?

Image source, Getty Images

Jolyon Palmer
Former Renault driver on BBC Radio 5 live

Bottas will be doing what he can to help Lewis Hamilton, but this will be no walk in the park for Hamilton and he has to stay clear of trouble - and that trouble could come from the two Red Bulls in front of him.

Image source, Reuters

BBC Weather's Ian Fergusson tells us... 'A dry event looking likely'

RACE: 18:21GMT Under an hour to race start, air temp 19C and expected to reach 21-22C this afternoon. Track currently 35C. A dry event looking likely; threat of showers (peaking post-race) is just 20% during race window in latest FIA forecast from MeteoFrance

Kris Waterson: Is that glock!?? - 2008 Championship winning year - Best moment! “Oh No no nooo!” - Lewis’s Team radio in Malaysia when his engine blew out in 2016 - Worst moment!

Leslie Hylton: Turkey 2010 we know why he was the angriest winner ever right? Button will not overtake you was Hamilton's radio message.

Dillon: This season all round Lewis has been on another level but if I had to pick one it has to be is victory in Germany, started 14th, Won the race with Vettel in the gravel and was really the turning point of this championship.

Image source, Getty Images

Andrew Benson
BBC Sport’s chief F1 writer

Is this the day that Lewis Hamilton becomes only the third five-time world champion in Formula 1 history? All he needs is a seventh place - or for Sebastian Vettel not to win the race. Both of which look eminently possible with a grid that has two Red Bulls in front, Hamilton third and Vettel fourth.

But there is potential loss as well as gain, especially on the run to what can be a chaotic first corner in Mexico, and Hamilton is well aware of it. “Everyone’s going to be barrelling into Turn One to gain,” he said, “so it’s a very, very fine line. If you go easy, you can get hit. If you go too aggressive, you can hit or still get hit. You’ve got to race it like normal and go in for the win. That’s what I’m going to be doing. I mean, that’s what we’re here to do, is to race.”

Image source, EPA

Jack Nicholls
Radio 5 live Formula 1 commentator

This is a place where motorsport is loved and it has got bigger and better here every year.

BBC Radio 5 live

Our commentary team of Jack Nicholls, Jolyon Palmer, and Jennie Gow are live on BBC Radio 5 live now, and you can listen at the top of the page.

Andrew Benson
BBC Sport’s chief F1 writer

Two Red Bulls on the front row at the end of a weekend the team have dominated should mean a Red Bull victory - the team’s fourth of the year, which would be their best haul in the turbo hybrid era. But Ferrari proved in Monza that a front-row lock-out is no guarantee of a victory, and the Red Bulls have the same man behind seeking opportunity as Ferrari did in Italy - Lewis Hamilton, arguably the best racer in the sport.

So what do Red Bull do? The drivers will be out for themselves - pride is at stake. But the team spent their morning briefing impressing upon them the need to also consider the team. Team boss Christian Horner has spoken about an element of “synchronised driving” on the run to Turn One, to fend off the Mercedes and Ferrari, which are not only more powerful, but will also have the benefit of a slipstream. Can they keep it clean? Max Verstappen said: “Of course that is always the intention. As a team we don’t think about the championship battle at all. we just try to win it.”

Image source, Getty Images