By Alan Baldwin

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Max Verstappen continued his Formula One comeback charge with the fastest time in practice for the Mexico City Grand Prix on Friday while McLaren rivals struggled.

Red Bull's four-time world champion, who has roared back into contention after being 104 points adrift at the end of August, lapped the Hermanos Rodriguez circuit in a best time of one minute 17.392 seconds despite complaining the medium tyre was like driving on ice.

The Dutch driver is 40 points adrift of McLaren's Oscar Piastri, and 26 behind the same team's Lando Norris, with five rounds remaining.

Ferrari's Charles Leclerc, fastest in a sunny first session with nine rookies or reserves replacing regular race drivers in line with regulations to give them track time, was second on the overall timesheets but 0.153 seconds slower.

LINDBLAD FASTEST OF THE NON-RACE DRIVERS

Verstappen had given up his car to up-and-coming F2 driver Arvid Lindblad for first practice and the Briton looked after it well while still going sixth fastest - best of the non-race drivers.

Mercedes' Kimi Antonelli was second and third in the respective sessions, with Norris fourth and 0.251 off the pace after sitting out the first practice while Mexican IndyCar driver Pato O'Ward took his car.

Piastri was fourth in the first session and 12th in the later one.

"It was okay," the Australian said of his performance. "The lap on softs, on low fuel, was pretty average, so I'm not surprised with the lap time.

"It's going to be tight, like always, but I think we have a good car underneath us."

Lindblad, strongly tipped for a seat at Racing Bulls next season, caught the eye as much as anyone in the opening session

"He did a very good job. It's so difficult to jump in. The pace is there, so not much to argue against that," said Red Bull principal Laurent Mekies, whose other race driver, Yuki Tsunoda, was eighth in the same session.

"I was given the pep-talk beforehand," said Lindblad, of stepping into Verstappen's car. "Obviously you never want to crash but there was even more emphasis on that in the session because of the amazing job the team have done over the last few races to bring themselves into the championship."

Sauber was the only team not to run a non-race driver.

Estonian reserve Paul Aron replaced Pierre Gasly at Alpine for session one and was 15th, with Argentine Franco Colapinto ninth in the team's other car as the Renault-owned outfit assessed options for next season.

Seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton handed his Ferrari over to endurance racer Antonio Fuoco, who was last on the timesheets. The Briton returned to set the fifth fastest time.

(Reporting by Alan Baldwin, Editing by Pritha Sarkar and Tom Hogue)