2023 Lenovo United States Grand Prix Race Recap

AUSTIN, Texas — Max Verstappen scored his 15th victory of the 2023 season and the 50th of his Formula One career after battling from sixth on the grid to victory at the United States Grand Prix.

The victory means he has leveled his own record for wins in a season – with four races remaining – and is now one first place away from being tied with Alain Prost for fourth place on the list of winners of all the time. .

The newly crowned champion sweated it out in the final laps of the race as Lewis Hamilton used an alternate strategy to cut his lead to 1.8 seconds at one point on the final lap and cross the finish line with 2.2 seconds to spare delay.

Hamilton’s joy on the podium was short-lived, as his Mercedes had violated F1 technical regulations: the seven-time world champion was disqualified four hours after finishing.

Although not relevant after the verdict, during the race itself Mercedes had appeared to miss their best chance of victory this year after attempting to switch Hamilton from a one-stop strategy back to a two-stop strategy stops when the performance of its tires dropped.

Verstappen was struggling with a brake problem before the halfway point of the race and at one point called his championship-winning Red Bull “crap” on team radio.

The Red Bull driver was in third place on lap 12 and passed Lando Norris for the lead on lap 28 of 56 with a move on the inside of Turn 12.

The McLaren driver tried to fight back into Turn 13 but found himself high and wide on the right-hander as Verstappen positioned his car defensively on the inside.

After making a second pit stop, Verstappen also had to pass Charles Leclerc to regain the lead, but it was a foregone conclusion as the Ferrari attempted an improbable one-stop strategy, leaving him on much worse tires.

Like Hamilton, Leclerc was also disqualified after the race for an identical infraction.

Hamilton had a compensated strategy compared to Norris and Verstappen, which saw him fall behind Red Bull during the first round of pit stops, but have fresher tires at the end of the race to pass Norris for the second place on lap 49 and bring back Verstappen afterwards.

Hamilton’s first subsequent stop was because Mercedes wanted to attempt a single stop, but had to run until around lap 23 to make it work. His first set of tires, however, did not want to play the game and after an error on the 20th lap, he was forced to return to the pits.

Norris’s overtake was among the best of the race, with Hamilton being pressed to the inside by Norris as he approached the corner to race back, take a faster line across the apex and complete the move on the descent up ‘at turn 2. .

Although Verstappen’s victory never really looked in danger as Hamilton ran out of laps to close the gap, the Dutchman sounded increasingly stressed on team radio as he begged his race engineer to do not talk to him when braking.

With Hamilton and Leclerc excluded from the race, Carlos Sainz took third place, although he did not celebrate on the podium.

Sergio Perez was promoted to fourth and Hamilton’s disqualification allowed him to gain points, rather than lose them, in the fight for second place in the drivers’ championship.

George Russell inherited sixth place in the other Mercedes, while Lance Stroll was in a well-deserved seventh position.

Yuki Tsunoda took eighth place and the extra point offered for the fastest lap.

The disqualifications of Hamilton and Leclerc propelled Williams duo Alex Albon and Logan Sargeant into the points.

For Sargeant, it meant his first F1 points at his home race, although the timing of the verdicts prevented him from celebrating on the circuit.