Charles Leclerc leads dominant Ferrari 1-2 in Austin! | 2024 F1 USA GP race report

Yesterday at 04:42 PM

Here is our full text transcript from the 19th round of the 2024 Formula 1 season:

Here we go then – it’s almost time for a race that rarely disappoints, the United States Grand Prix around the fast and flowing Circuit of the Americas. It has been a fairly intense and dramatic Sprint weekend in Austin to this point – on and off track – and we haven’t even had the main event 56-lap Grand Prix yet! The good news is is said main event should be full of talking points too, especially with title rivals Lando Norris and Max Verstappen lining up alongside each other on the front row – with title challenger in front of title leader.

Sky Sports F1’s Danica Patrick ahead of the start of the race:

“Overall as a team they have been the strongest overall if you look at it. It has been a really calm weekend for them. Obviously Carlos was able to push really bard and have the tyres underneath him [in the Sprint].”

How big a threat are the Ferraris to the front two? On the evidence of yesterday, quite a significant one. While the SF-24 hasn’t had the outright qualifying pace around the Circuit of the Americas, it certainly looked particularly good on its tyres over the 19 laps of the Sprint when both Carlos Sainz and Charles Leclerc finished particularly strongly, with the former passing Lando Norris for second and the latter almost doing the same.

Carlos Sainz, who starts his final series of races for the Prancing Horse before his winter move to Williams, has looked particularly racy so far. And he predicted last night: “I think the field is going to be very close and it should be an exciting race between a few cars. I’m confident that if we do a good job together, for sure we can fight with these two guys [Lando and Max], whether we can beat them starting behind them, that’s another thing. It’s never easy to overtake in Formula 1 and never easy to, especially the McLaren and Red Bull.”

Normally, you want to start in pole position in Formula 1 but the last three United States GP have seen the driver in second lead after the first corner. Will we see the same today with Max Verstappen in second behind pole-sitter Lando Norris?

All of the front-runners will be starting on the mediums. Lance Stroll in 13th, Franco Colapinto in 15th, Lewis Hamilton in 16th, Liam Lawson in 19th and George Russell in the pit lane have chosen to start on the hards. The formation lap begins and all 19 cars get away cleanly. Key moments now to warm up the tyres.

Lap 1/56: Lando Norris gets a good start but leaves enough space for Max Verstappen to dive up the inside. The Red Bull runs Norris wide on the way out of the first corner, and Charles Leclerc sweeps through to take the lead. Sainz also gets past Norris, who is down to fourth. Lewis Hamilton has made a great start and is up to 12th as Esteban Ocon spins at the back.

Lap 2/56: Max Verstappen is forced to cover the inside at Turn 12 as Carlos Sainz is on the attack again. Max Verstappen keeps him behind but the Ferrari looks quicker right now.

Lap 3/56: Lewis Hamilton is in the gravel at Turn 19. That’s where George Russell crashed yesterday. It looks like Hamilton is out of the race. We have a Safety Car.

Lando Norris on the team radio after McLaren say they reported the incident at Turn One where they feel Max Verstappen pushed him wide: “He clearly pushed me off. He had no intent to make the corner. Even he went off the track. I had to avoid crashing into him or him into me.”

Lap 5/56: The Safety Car returns to the pit lane and Charles Leclerc will lead the field back under way.

Lap 6/56: Charles Leclerc hasn’t done very well of creating a gap to Max Verstappen at the restart, but still manages to make it through the first corner in the lead. He’s got a lap to build some breathing space before DRS is enabled again.

Lap 7/56: Charles Leclerc has sped clear of Max Verstappen to open up a 1.3s gap, which puts him out of DRS range. Carlos Sainz has stayed within a second of Verstappen though, and the Dutchman is under pressure once more. Nico Hulkenberg coats by Fernando Alonso to get into the points. That’s 10th for Hulkenberg and his Haas team-mate Kevin Magnussen is in seventh. This could be a great day for the American outfit.

Lap 8/56: Max Verstappen has found some speed. While he’s not getting any closer to Charles Leclerc, whose lead is up to two seconds, the Red Bull driver has gone clear of Carlos Sainz, who no longer has DRS. Lando Norris is a further 1.5s behind Sainz.

Sainz complains of power issue
Lap 9/56: Carlos Sainz is sounding very distressed over team radio. He says he’s lacking power on the exit of corners, and that he can smell fuel in the car. He’s still more than a second clear of Norris, so it’s not troubling him too much right now it would appear. But it doesn’t sound good…

Lap 10/56: Zhou Guanyu loops his Sauber around all by himself at Turn One. He drops from 15th to the back of the field.

Lap 11/56: Charles Leclerc is flying. The Monegasque is almost four seconds clear of Max Verstappen out front. Carlos Sainz has been given an instruction to fix his issue, which seems to have worked, and is only 1.5s back from Verstappen. Lando Norris is two seconds further back. It’s unclear whether he’s lacking pace or is just biding his time.

Lap 12/56: Sergio Perez is in ninth place, stuck behind Yuki Tsunoda. Ideally, Red Bull will want Perez to be within 20 seconds of Lando Norris in fourth, so when the McLaren driver pits, Perez can potentially hold him up.

Lap 12/56: Liam Lawson is the latest driver to overtake Fernando Alonso with a move into Turn 12. The pair had a great fight yesterday, with Alonso calling Lawson an “idiot” on the radio. Alonso doesn’t fight him too hard though this time.

Lap 14/56: George Russell is making steady progress. He’s just squeezed up the inside of Valtteri Bottas to take 14th.

Lap 14/56: Ferrari say Plan B is the baseline, so it sounds like they still want to do a two-stop for Charles Leclerc. His lead is now up to six seconds over Verstappen.

Lap 15/56: Max Verstappen has an issue, apparently. He’s just been told on the radio: “Found a bit of an issue with the car this stint. Hopefully we’ll sort it out at the stop. Just hang on in there as best you can this stint.” He’s now more than six seconds back from Charles Leclerc.

Lap 16/56: George Russell is handed a five-second time penalty for forcing another driver off the track. That’s for his overtake on Valtteri Bottas earlier on. Russell is currently in 13th and that penalty does seem a bit harsh.

Lap 18/56: Back at the front, Charles Leclerc is seven seconds in front of Max Verstappen. Carlos Sainz is a further two seconds back from Verstappen, with Lando Norris 3.5 seconds adrift of Sainz.

Lap 22/56: Into the pits comes Carlos Sainz and it’s the hard tyres now on the car. Ferrari are trying to undercut Max Verstappen. Big out lap now for Sainz and in this United States GP.

Lap 23/56: Red Bull have not pitted Max Verstappen interestingly. That’s an important decision which we may look back on later in the race as Carlos Sainz is flying on those new tyres.

Lap 24/56: Charles Leclerc is 10 seconds ahead of Max Verstappen but appears to have noticed his Ferrari team-mate Carlos Sainz has pitted. “Don’t leave me out too long. I don’t want to be under pressure,” he says on the radio. The Ferrari pair had a brilliant battle yesterday in the Sprint.

Lap 25/56: Lando Norris gets within three seconds of Max Verstappen as he’s taken one second out of him in the last couple of laps. Norris is on a charge and Verstappen says his “left-hand side tyres are quite bad now”.

Lap 26/56: Max Verstappen comes in and unsurprisingly emerges almost five seconds behind Carlos Sainz in fifth. Lando Norris is now in free air, 13 seconds back from leader Leclerc.

Lap 27/56: Charles Leclerc comes in from first place and it’s a nice 2.5-second pit stop onto new hard tyres. Leclerc emerges in third place but the two McLarens of Lando Norris and Oscar Piastri are yet to pit.

Lap 28/56: We are halfway through the United States GP, with both Norris and Piastri yet to pit. Leclerc, Sainz and Verstappen have all stopped for hard tyres and it looks like everyone is now doing a one-stop race, so those three drivers will be going to the end. McLaren are doing a longer stint now to have fresher rubber for the second half of the race.

Lap 29/56: Lando Norris is going well out front on his ageing tyres, but Charles Leclerc is closing up on the McLarens. The Monegasque is now just 1.5s behind Oscar Piastri in second. Does Piastri have the pace to hold up Leclerc for a bit?

Lap 31/56: Charles Leclerc goes down the inside of Oscar Piastri to take second place. Piastri doesn’t make it too difficult, so he doesn’t lose time. Surely Piastri will pit soon.

Lap 32/56: Lando Norris finally relents and comes in. He comes out in fifth, six seconds behind Max Verstappen. He does also have a six-lap tyre advantage over the Dutchman, and a 10-lap delta to Sainz, who is four seconds ahead of Verstappen.

Lap 33/56: And now Oscar Piastri comes into the pits for a set of hards. He comes out in fifth place, six seconds behind McLaren team-mate Lando Norris. The chase is on for both McLaren drivers with 24 laps to go of the United States GP. Lando Norris sets a new fastest lap of the race but it’s only a couple tenths quicker than Max Verstappen. 5.8 seconds is the gap.

Lap 35/56: Charles Leclerc does a personal best lap and is seven seconds in front of Carlos Sainz now. Ferrari are on course for a one-two here, just like they had at the Australian Grand Prix.

Lap 36/56: Lando Norris is absolutely flying! He took a second out of Max Verstappen on the previous lap and is on course to do so again this time around. The gap is down to just over four seconds

Lap 36/56: Yuki Tsunoda is the latest driver to receive a five-second time penalty for forcing another driver off the track. Yet again, Alex Albon is the driver on the outside. He’s down in 13th at the moment behind Pierre Gasly, who also has the same penalty.

Lap 38/56: Sergio Perez eventually gets the job done to pass Franco Colapinto. The Mexican is up to P7 but lost quite a lot of time getting past a car on very old tyres!

Lap 39/56: Kevin Magnussen is urgently told to pit from ninth. He must have had a puncture or something was stuck in his airbox and caused the car to overheat. Magnussen is now down in 13th and that promotes Liam Lawson into the points.

Lap 40/56: It appeared for a moment that Carlos Sainz might be fancying applying some pressure to his Ferrari team-mate Charles Leclerc out front. However, Leclerc immediately responds by setting the fastest lap of the race to ensure his lead stays well over ix seconds. There is another six seconds between Sainz and Versatppen.

Lap 41/56: We have momentary yellow flags after a Yuki Tsunoda spin at Turn 1. You wonder if that frustration we heard coming through on the radio before has played a part in that.

Lap 43/56: Carlos Sainz hits back at the front with another fastest lap. He’s brought his team-mate’s lead under six seconds. Leclerc’s tyres are five laps fresher, so it would be very surprising if Sainz were able to maintain his charge.

Lap 43/56: The gap is just over one second between Verstappen and Norris now. Norris is almost within DRS range.

Lap 44/56: Lando Norris gets DRS and closes to within a few metres of Max Verstappen on the back straight. A move feels inevitable!

Lap 46/56: George Russell has just passed Nico Hulkenberg for P7, and is flying. He’s only six seconds back from Sergio Perez, and is going much faster than the Red Bull.

Lap 46/56: Norris is as close as he’s been yet coming off Turn 11 but still not there to have a go at Verstappen into Turn 12. This is a brilliant battle, both drivers giving it everything here.

Lap 47/56: Verstappen goes deep into the first corner but stays ahead. Norris is right on his gearbox now though. Verstappen covers the inside into Turn 12 and Norris tries to duck back underneath through the next few corners. The McLaren driver can’t do it though and Verstappen is still in third place!

Lap 48/56: It seems secondary to the battle for third, but the Ferraris both appear to be pushing hard out front. The gap is hovering around five seconds. Leclerc would appear to have enough in the bag to see this out.

Lap 48/56: Franco Colapinto continues to impress! The Argentine rookie, who is running in 10th, has just set the fastest lap of the race. He’s just under four seconds behind Liam Lawson, who is also having a fine day.

Lap 50/56: George Russell is still going well. He’s within three seconds of Sergio Perez and we might have another wheel-to-wheel battle to follow in the closing stages here. Yet again Norris is close into Turn One but Verstappen fends him off. Verstappen locks up into Turn 12 but gets the car turned in and remains in third place.

Lap 51/56: Norris is as close as he’s been to Verstappen but the Red Bull driver puts his car in the right place and keeps him behind through Turns 12, 13, 14 and 15. Stunning racing from the title protagonists and Verstappen is holding on.

Lap 52/56: Charles Leclerc is looking very good out front. His lead over team-mate Carlos Sainz is back up to six seconds, and a Ferrari one-two seems certain now.

Lap 52/56: Norris gets the move down at Turn 12 but it appears to be off the track!

Lap 53/56: Now Norris is defending and he sweeps across the track at Turn One to cover off Verstappen. This could get controversial. Lap 54/56: The stewards have unsurprisingly noted the incident for Norris leaving the track and gaining an advantage.

Lap 54/56: George Russell is on the rear wing of Sergio Perez and now has two laps to pass the Red Bull.

Lap 55/56: Meanwhile, Charles Leclerc leads Carlos Sainz by 6.8 seconds. Lando Norris is three seconds in front of Max Verstappen and Oscar Piastri is another two seconds back.

Lap 55/56: Lando Norris could be in trouble here. He breached track limits on laps 51, and is now one more breach away from a five-second penalty. He needs to be careful.

Lap 56/56: Lando Norris is given a five-second time penalty for leaving the track and gaining an advantage. For clarity, that’s for overtaking Max Verstappen off the track. There will be A LOT of talk about that incident.

Chequered flag: Charles Leclerc, despite not being on tv for the final 20 laps, claims a pretty comfortable victory. Sainz comes home eight seconds back to seal the Ferrari one-two.

A brilliant day for the Italian team!

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