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Charles Leclerc secured his third victory of the season with a dominant performance at COTA, while Carlos Sainz rounded out a perfect day for Ferrari by finishing second. Lando Norris once again failed to capitalize on his pole position; after struggling behind Max Verstappen for third place in the closing laps, he went off track, receiving a five-second penalty that dropped him to fourth.
The Monegasque driver expressed his happiness with the victory, especially considering he didn’t have an easy weekend. The young driver acknowledged that he faced some challenges at times, but he was confident he could achieve a good result. While Ferrari has been struggling with consistency, he is someone who always believes they can elevate their performance and strive to maintain that consistency. He is thrilled with his team’s performance and grateful that everyone played a crucial role in this victory.
“[I’m] very happy,” Leclerc said, as quoted by Formula 1.
“It hasn’t been an easy weekend, until now I have been struggling a bit with the feeling with the car, but I had the confidence that in the race the feeling was better and it was the case.
We’ve seen it yesterday in the Sprint race, we were a bit… not scared, but we thought the others would improve a lot more today but we still had the upper hand, so [I’m] really happy with today. A one-two for the team, we couldn’t have dreamed for better.”
Leclerc explained that he felt like he was at a disadvantage during the previous race, being in the wrong place at the wrong time. However, he turned that around in the current race, benefiting from it and helping to secure a strong first stint with impressive pace. In the second stint, his focus was on managing the race from behind. He praised the car's overall performance throughout the weekend, crediting the engineers for their hard work over the past few months to implement upgrades introduced in Singapore and other recent races, stressing that their efforts are clearly paying off.
Order of the other drivers
Oscar Piastri finished fifth, where he started, while George Russell made an impressive recovery to sixth place. The Mercedes driver qualified in that position but had to start from the pit lane due to changes made to his car during the parc ferme period following his crash in qualifying.
Sergio Perez finished seventh, ahead of Nico Hülkenberg, and Liam Lawson delivered a great performance, moving from 19th to ninth after penalties for power unit component changes. The final point went to Franco Colapinto, the Argentine rookie, who secured his second points finish in four races.
The Texas track lived up to its reputation as a modern classic with an exciting race filled with interesting battles throughout the field. Norris had a solid start, but Verstappen managed to take the inside line at the first corner, causing both to run wide and allowing Leclerc to move from fourth to the lead. Verstappen held onto second and defended against Sainz later in the lap, while Norris dropped to fourth.
At the end of the second lap, Lewis Hamilton spun in the same spot where Russell had yesterday. Although he didn’t hit the barrier, he got stuck in the gravel and had to retire. This triggered the first safety car deployment since the Canadian Grand Prix, marking a streak of nine races and two sprints without it.
Most drivers started on mediums and completed the race with one pit stop, switching to hards. Russell, Lawson, Colapinto, and Stroll adopted a reverse strategy. Sainz was the first of the leaders to pit on lap 22, and when Verstappen made his stop on lap 26, the Spaniard passed him. Leclerc pitted a lap later, while the McLarens stayed out an additional five laps with Norris and six laps longer with Piastri.
Norris caught up to Verstappen on lap 44, but even with DRS, he couldn’t find a way past the Dutch driver’s defense. On lap 53, he attempted an outside move at turn 12 and went off track. The team decided not to return the position, resulting in a five-second penalty, which meant he finished behind Verstappen and lost three additional points in the championship.
The next race will take place in a week in Mexico, where the usual weekend format awaits.
It’s difficult to give a definitive answer on who might dominate in this race, as this season has brought many unpredictable results and moments we didn’t see coming. Verstappen is still in the lead, but it’s clear that Red Bull is facing a number of challenges.
Some will try to take advantage of the crisis of the Austrian team.
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