United States Grand Prix – The race: Verstappen wins thanks to pit stops

An animated start, a few damaged front fins

For this start, Lewis Hamilton starts second and on the dirty side of the track. He is also sandwiched between the two Red Bulls.

But the take-off is missed for the Dutchman. He squeezes his opponent to the extreme left of the track, and they attack side by side in this first corner.

The British driver retaliates and forces Verstappen to widen his trajectory. This way, Sergio Perez comes back alongside his teammate, he plays his role of protector well by allowing him to keep his second place.

Behind, it’s Ferrari and McLaren that are having a fierce battle. With track cuts, the orange cars put pressure on Carlos Sainz who is struggling with his soft tires. Finally, Daniel Ricciardo quickly finds the solution and moves up to 5th position, just behind Charles Leclerc.

The duels are launched!

Towards the back of the pack, Latifi believes he was sandwiched, he clashed with Stroll and sent him into a spin. His front wing is damaged.

The same goes for Esteban Ocon, who had to return to the pits suddenly and thus switch to the hard tire.

Hamilton in the lead, under pressure

Once these first rounds are over, the race pace gradually settles in, with Lewis Hamilton setting the tone.

The two Red Bulls are comfortable in the twisty sections, but the Mercedes’ top speed is impressive and annihilates any attempt of action from car number 33.

Sergio Perez stays 3 seconds behind his teammate, the Austrian team is clearly aiming for a one-two finish today.

Behind the battles between Ferrari and McLaren are taking place over 13 seconds.

On the tenth lap, the first stops: the Red Bull undercut.

Yuki Tsunoda launches the wave of pit stops, he is followed by Russell and Giovinazzi.

At the same time, Verstappen announces that he does not feel good with his soft tires. He finds that they are overheating. To everyone’s surprise, he stops and switches to the hardest compound, but goes back out into heavy traffic.

Hamilton didn’t miss that and chose to stay on track. He is not covering his opponent’s strategy. And it’s Perez who is in charge of chasing him.

Very quickly, the Dutchman picks up the pace and chains together very good lap times. So Sergio Perez also comes in, at the same time as the Ferraris. For the Mexican, the strategy is different: he puts on medium tires. The goal is to put pressure on Hamilton and Mercedes. Force him to pit.

It’s done, Mercedes switches Hamilton to hard tires, but the damage is done, Verstappen has gained 6 seconds on his opponent in three laps. Perez is still lurking 5 seconds behind Hamilton.

Shortly before midway, Hamilton gets back on track.

As the tensions settled down during about ten laps after the pit stops, Hamilton chose to step up his race. He attacks a bit more and gradually catches up with his rival. At the halfway point, the gap is only two seconds.

Meanwhile Alonso is up against the Alfa Romeo. A first time against Räikkönen’s N°7. At the first turn, the two world champions touch each other, Alonso sending the Finn off the track and tearing off a piece of his floor. But the native of Espoo doesn’t let himself be counted and passes Alonso.

A few laps later, Alonso meets the other Alfa Romeo, that of Giovonazzi. The two of them offer us a great battle. Pushing the limits, each going off track. Alonso once again showed himself to be very aggressive, but ultimately managed to defeat the Italian.

The disappointment comes from the second Mercedes. Valtteri Bottas is stuck behind in 8th place. He struggled for a long time against Tsunoda’s AlphaTauri.

The 30th lap marks the second round of pit stops.

And it’s Max Verstappen who who stops to put on a new set of hard tires. He is followed the next lap by his teammate. The McLaren and Ferrari drivers do the same by covering each other’s strategy.

At Mercedes, Hamilton pushes the right pedal and sets a new lap record. This time Mercedes has the upper hand in managing his strategy. Perez seems no longer able to challenge the Briton. And the latter seems to have tires that are working well. He has managed to save them and is not losing time against Verstappen’s new tires.

Finally, the reigning champion switches to his second set of hard tires on the 38th lap and the time gaps remained almost the same as before these second pit stops. He is 9 seconds behind number 33 and 13 seconds ahead of Perez.

Lewis Hamilton is relying on fresh tires for the end of the race

After taking the time on a few laps to heat up his tires, Lewis Hamilton set out to catch up with his opponent before the end of the race.

Thus, with ten laps to go, there are only 3 seconds of a gap with his rival’s Red Bull.

The Briton shows his teeth, sets the fastest lap in the race and quickly puts pressure on the Dutch driver.

With five laps to go, he is less than two seconds behind. But Verstappen has also preserved some tire wear, and the Mercedes is struggling to get closer due to aerodynamic disturbances.

Number 44 goes all in on the last two laps and can’t get any closer to Red Bull number 33. Verstappen is saved by Schumacher. Furthermore, by overtaking a backmarker, he benefits from DRS at the perfect moment.

The end of the race proved to be very difficult for Verstappen, one more lap was not needed. He secures his eighth victory of the season.

A little further on, Bottas caught up with Sainz, and just like Hamilton did with Sainz, he can try a few DRS moves, and manages to regain sixth place.

In the points, thanks to his tenth place, Kimi Räikkönen thought he would increase his points total, but a violent rear end slide made him lose control of his car, and it’s Vettel who takes advantage to claim that famous point for Aston Martin.

Race results