Lewis Hamilton extended his world championship lead to 24 points after passing Mercedes team mate Nico Rosberg to win the Austin Grand Prix. The Red Bull Racing driver, Daniel Ricciardo, made his way through the field from fifth on the grid to finish third, but now out of the title
In Their own words:
DANIEL RICCIARDO, Finish Position: 3rd, Start Position: 5th
“I’m happy with that. I could see the Mercedes for the first part of the race which was really cool, I don’t know if they were just chilling, but we seemed to have good pace. It was great to get ahead of the Williams and to get onto the podium. The start wasn’t very good, I have to put my hand up to that one, but the recovery was good so we didn’t really lose out. The pit stops were really good, Red Bull is known for being awesome in the pits and they showed it today.”
SEBASTIAN VETTEL, Finish Position: 7th, Start Position: Pit Lane
“The first half of the race wasn’t so good. The second half it came more alive and we were able to make up some ground with a pit-stop near the end of the race. We decided to go for fresh tyres with only a few laps to go, so we were in a stronger position at that point compared to others who were struggling on older tyres and the pace was better. The low downforce set up was good for passing, but it made it difficult to stay close to people.”
CHRISTIAN HORNER, Team Principal: “After a poor start, it was a fantastic recovery from Daniel. Some of his overtaking manoeuvres, along with the today’s pit work, got us back ahead of Fernando and the two Williams to take a place on the podium, so an incredible drive by Daniel. For Sebastian, after starting from the pit lane, he had a difficult first stint struggling with the wind; his race really started to come alive on his second set of tyres. Then, with a final stop going onto the soft tyres for the last eight laps, he drove incredibly well to finish seventh place from the pit lane – so a good team performance today.”
THIERRY SALVI, Renault: “Daniel delivered another great result for the team today after starting fifth, dropping down to seventh and charging back to finish third. There were some great overtaking moves at a circuit where top-end horsepower is critical. Likewise Seb, who started from the pits and fought back superbly. He struggled a lot with the car during his first stint, but then came alive as the fuel load dropped. There were no problems with his Power Unit either, which helped him fight his way back up to seventh on the option tyre at the end. Once again both drivers have done the job. It’s now a question of being able to complete the final two races with these Power Units. Reliability is obviously key and we’ll be looking at everything in order to preserve them.”
Source: Red Bull Racing
2014 United States Grand Prix – Formula One World Championship
Nov 2 – Circuit of the Americas – 56 laps – 192 miles
Leaderboard – Final Points Time/Lag Avg. mph
1 United Kingdom Lewis Hamilton – Mercedes
25 1:40:04.785 184.895
2 Germany Nico Rosberg – Mercedes
18 +4.314 Sec 184.762
3 Australia Daniel Ricciardo – Red Bull
15 +25.560 Sec 184.111
4 Brazil Felipe Massa – Williams
12 +26.924 Sec 184.07
5 Finland Valtteri Bottas – Williams
10 +30.992 Sec 183.946
6 Spain Fernando Alonso – Ferrari
8 +1:35.231 Sec 182.009
7 Germany Sebastian Vettel – Red Bull
6 +1:35.734 Sec 181.994
8 Denmark Kevin Magnussen – McLaren
4 +1:40.682 Sec 181.846
9 Venezuela Pastor Maldonado – Lotus
2 +1:47.870 Sec 181.632
10 France Jean-Eric Vergne – Toro Rosso
1 +1:48.863 Sec 181.603
11 France Switzerland Romain Grosjean – Lotus
0 – 181.433
12 England United Kingdom Jenson Button – McLaren
0 – 181.399
13 Finland Kimi Raikkonen – Ferrari
0 – 180.993
14 Mexico Esteban Gutierrez – Sauber
0 – 180.96
15 Russia Daniil Kvyat – Toro Rosso
0 – 180.769
16 Germany Nico Hulkenberg – Force India
0 – 169.334
17 Mexico Sergio Perez – Force India
0 – 127.285
18 Germany Adrian Sutil – Sauber 0
0 – –