With six rounds remaining for the end of the Formula 1 World Championship, six points separate the leader and contender, Max Verstappen (Red Bull), from the seven-time champion Lewis Hamilton (Mercedes). The Dutch driver is confident of consolidating his position at the top of the classification in the United States Grand Prix, which he has never won. In 2019, the Mercedes achieved the double on the American track, but Verstappen He entered third at the finish line and since then Red Bull has gained competitiveness, pointing to a race with an uncertain prognosis this Sunday at the Circuit of the Americas.
Fernando Alonso (Alpine) considers it one of the “most challenging tracks on the calendar” because each sector is different from the next and the characteristics of the track and the car can evolve from one turn to another.
Formula 1 has not been on this track, which offers overtaking possibilities, since 2019 (last year the Grand Prix was suspended due to the pandemic) Its bumpy asphalt has been partially renovated, although the MotoGP riders, who raced here two weeks ago, they were critical of the track.
The finish straight or the exit of Turn 1 are some of the sections that have been updated and Pirelli has opted for the medium range (C2, C3 and C4) of compounds for the return, two years later to the United States with the World Championship very tight.
Leader, Verstappen, has not won since last September 5, but adds 262.5 points and leads by 6 to Hamilton. Stevenage won in Russia at the end of last month, while in Turkey, in the previous World Cup event, he changed part of the power unit, lost ten positions on the starting grid and finished fifth.
Hamilton gave up the first position of the Drivers’ World Cup, but the situation could have been worse if he had not had the help of his teammate, the Finnish Valtteri Bottas, that in the throes of his time at Mercedes he scored the victory ahead of ‘Mad ‘Max.
On the Turkish podium, the Mexican accompanied them Sergio ‘Checo’ Pérez (Red Bull), who also acted as squire in a dispute with Hamilton in which he offered titanic resistance. The cocktail was joined by the Monegasque Charles Leclerc (Ferrari), who finished between them (fourth).
Turkey catapulted Carlos Sainz (Ferrari), distinguished by popular vote as the driver of the day, after having starred in a spectacular comeback after being penalized for the changes he introduced to the engine of his car, novelties that Leclerc He had already tried in the previous event, Russia, where the Madrilenian climbed to the podium for the first time. In Austin, Sainz and Leclerc will continue their mission to help Ferrari in its particular fight with McLaren for third place in the constructors’ world championship.
And it is that if between the pilots the battle is adjusted, between the constructors, more of the same: 36 points in favor of Mercedes over Red Bull in the title fight, while McLaren, on the podium, defends an income of seven and a half points over Ferrari and Alpine counts twelve with respect to Alpha tauri.Fernando Alonso could not score in Turkey in a weekend in which he signed a good classification (sixth place), but his aspirations were ruined in the first lap after an incident with the French Pierre Gasly (Alpha Tauri) who sent him to the caboose, where, also in those first moments, he had a touch with the German Mick schumacher (Haas).
The rain has accompanied in the last appointments of the calendar and it is not clear that in Austin it will give a truce. Forecasts are unclear for the weekend.
Austin’s 20-turn counterclockwise circuit is 5,513 meters long, and the drivers will give it 56 laps (the fastest lap was set by Leclerc in 2019, 1: 36,169) to cover a total distance of 308.405 kilometers.
It will be the ninth time that Formula 1 has visited that track, which hosted its first grand prix of the premier class in 2012 with victory for Lewis Hamilton with McLaren before his switch to Mercedes. On that podium were the German Sebastian Vettel and Fernando Alonso.
Hamilton won consecutively, in 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017; finnish Kimi Raikonnen (Alfa Romeo) did it with Ferrari in 2018 (it was his last triumph in Formula 1) and the Mercedes star shone again in 2019 by the hand of Bottas.
VerstappenAlthough he has not won there, he has been on the podium in his last two visits: he was second, starting eighteenth, in 2018, and third two years ago. A new pulse looms with Hamilton.
The United States Grand Prix will begin on Friday with free practice (6:30 p.m. and 10 p.m. CEST), on Saturday the third batch will be held (8:00 p.m. CEST) and qualifying (23:00 CEST) and on Sunday the The race will be held at 21:00 (CEST).
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