Lewis Hamilton drove his Mercedes AMG Petronas to his fifth consecutive F1 victory Sunday before a sun-baked crowd at the United States Grand Prix held at Circuit of the Americas Sunday. He now leads the points standings by 24 points ahead of his teammate, pole sitter Nico Roseberg, who finished 4.314 seconds behind, in second place.
The Mercedes 1-2 finish made it only the tenth time for a team to have five 1-2 finishes in a single season.
Third, sporting the iconic Dale Earnhardt number 3 on his helmet, was Daniel Ricciardo from Infinity Red Bull Racing. He remains third in the Driver’s Championship standings, but has been mathematically eliminated from winning overall.
Photos by Jay Bonvouloir and Jon Cronk.
Fourth and fifth were Williams Martini Racing teammates, Felipe Massa and Valtteri Bottas.
The other points-earning drivers were Fernando Alonso/Scuderia Ferrari; Sebastien Vettel/Infiniti Red Bull Racing; Kevin Magnussen/McLaren Mercedes; Jules Vergne/Scuderia Toro Rosso, who survived skirmishes and two penalties; and Pastor Maldonado/Lotus F1 Team, who was assessed a time penalty during the race for his part in the First Lap Turn One incident, the penalty being a record five for the season. The three-car incident retired Adrian Sutil/Sauber F1 Team and Sergio Perez/Sahara Force India F1 Team, who was also assessed a penalty for his part.
The other retirement in the race was Nico Hulkenberg/Sahara Force India F1 Team, who pulled off course on Lap 17 on orders from his team because of a drive problem.
Vettel charged through the field from his pit lane start to finish the seventh and turn the fastest race lap of 1:41.379 on Lap 50 of the 56-lap race. He made four pit stops, two under the Safety Car situation on Lap One.
The ambient temperatures ranged 80 degrees down to 75F at the end, translating to 27/23C. The track temperature was 89F/32C. There wasn’t as much wind as earlier in the weekend.
Although crowd counts aren’t given, those watching thought attendance was good. This despite the NASCAR race a few hours away at Texas Motor Speedway.
