Charles Leclerc achieved his third win of the 2024 season at the Circuit of the Americas, finishing ahead of Carlos Sainz giving Scuderia Ferrari a double podium. Lando Norris lost out on third position following a five-second penalty in a tense battle with Max Verstappen.
The Ferrari driver made a perfect start to jump on the battling front-row duo of Max Verstappen and Lando Norris, cutting back down the inside of Turn 1 and escaping through the sweeping corners with the lead.
He immediately gathered a 1.6-second lead at the end of the first lap to hold off the threat of Verstappen with DRS, as the Red Bull driver had benefitted from a conservative approach from Norris into the first corner to pick up second.
Leclerc then had to defend from Verstappen after a safety car brought out midway through the third lap, caused by Lewis Hamilton spinning off at Turn 18 and beaching his Mercedes in the gravel to end a nightmare weekend.
Although Verstappen stuck with Leclerc on the restart, the Ferrari driver covered off the Red Bull through the Turn 2-8 complex of corners to ensure there was no threat from behind.
Having gone long into the race on a one-stop, which proved to be the most popular strategy, Leclerc emerged from the pits after his lap 26 stop behind the long-running McLarens as Norris and Oscar Piastri sought to gather a tyre offset into the final stages of the race.
Leclerc resumed the lead once the McLarens stopped, but this was now over teammate Carlos Sainz; the Ferrari had successfully batted away an earlier power issue to stay with Verstappen and then undercut the Red Bull with a stop four laps sooner.
Sainz occasionally ate into Leclerc’s lead, cutting a seven-second advantage down to under six seconds, but Leclerc had the legs over Sainz in the final laps and cemented his victory from fourth on the grid.
But the box-office action emerged in the battle for third, where Max’s struggles on the hard tyre and Lando’s pace on a six-lap younger set of white-walled Pirellis pitted the two into a dramatic battle for the final step on the podium.
Norris cut down a six-second advantage and got within DRS range of Verstappen by lap 45, setting up a series of attempted overtakes as their championship battle became a pure joy to watch.
Verstappen’s defence was excellent and he kept Norris contained; Norris struggled to get within the half-second needed to make a real attempt to pass on the back straight and into Turn 12.
The moment became critical on lap 52, where Norris tried to make a move on Verstappen down the outside – but both drivers went wide and Norris passed off-track to be ahead. Hoping to cover off the threat of a five-second penalty, Norris tried to drop Verstappen but only built up an advantage of 4.1 seconds.
The race stewards gave Norris the five seconds for passing off-track, ensuring Verstappen made it onto the podium by just 0.9 seconds.
Piastri was a further 1.5 seconds behind Norris in the final race times to collect fifth, 34 seconds clear of George Russell – who converted a pitlane start in the wake of his qualifying crash into sixth, thanks to a late pass on Sergio Perez.
Nico Hulkenberg took eighth to ensure Haas could put two points between it and RB in the fight for sixth in the constructors’ championship, although Liam Lawson celebrated his return to Formula 1 with ninth place with the contra-strategy of starting on hards.
Franco Colapinto collected the final point having also benefitted from starting on the hard tyre, eight seconds ahead of Magnussen – whose impressive race was undone by having to stop twice.
So a fantastic result for Ferrari with this 1-2 at the United States Grand Prix and it was a perfect drive to win for Charles Leclerc. And yet all talking points is the battle between Max Verstappen and Lando Norris and, with the former extending his points as the latter received a post-race penalty for gaining a track advantage.
United States Grand Prix, race results:
1 Charles Leclerc Ferrari 1:35:09.639
2 Carlos Sainz Ferrari +8.562s
3 Max Verstappen Red Bull +19.412s
4 Lando Norris McLaren +20.354s
5 Oscar Piastri McLaren +21.921s
6 George Russell Mercedes +56.295s
7 Sergio Perez Red Bull +59.072s
8 Nico Hulkenberg Haas +62.957s
9 Liam Lawson RB +70.563s
10 Franco Colapinto Williams +71.782s
11 Kevin Magnussen Haas +79.782s
12 Pierre Gasly Alpine +90.558s
13 Fernando Alonso Aston Martin +1 lap
14 Yuki Tsunoda RB +1 lap
15 Lance Stroll Aston Martin +1 lap
16 Alexander Albon Williams +1 lap
17 Valtteri Bottas Sauber +1 lap
18 Esteban Ocon Alpine +1 lap
19 Zhou Guanyu Sauber +1 lap
20 Lewis Hamilton Mercedes DNF