2014 United States Grand Prix

United States  2014 United States Grand Prix
Race details[1]
Race 17 of 19 in the 2014 Formula One season

Date 2 November 2014
Official name 2014 Formula 1 United States Grand Prix
Location Circuit of the Americas
Travis County, Austin, Texas
Course Permanent racing facility
5.513 km (3.426 mi)
Distance 56 laps, 308.405 km (191.634 mi)
Weather Partly cloudy with temperatures reaching a maximum of 24 degrees during the day.
Attendance 237,406[2][3]
Pole position
Driver Germany Nico Rosberg Mercedes
Time 1:36.067
Fastest lap
Driver Germany Sebastian Vettel Red Bull-Renault
Time 1:41.379 on lap 50
Podium
First United Kingdom Lewis Hamilton Mercedes
Second Germany Nico Rosberg Mercedes
Third Australia Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull-Renault

The 2014 United States Grand Prix was a Formula One motor race held at the Circuit of the Americas on 2 November 2014.[4] The race was the seventeenth round of the 2014 season, and marked the third running of the United States Grand Prix in Austin, and thirty-sixth time the race has been run as a round of the World Championship.

As both the Marussia and Caterham teams were under administration, they did not participate in the Grand Prix, and thus the race featured a field of only 18 cars. This is the smallest field entered into a Grand Prix event since the 2005 Monaco Grand Prix. The race was won by Lewis Hamilton.[5][6]

Report

Background

Tyres

Pirelli brought their white-banded Medium compound tyre as its prime selection and yellow-banded Soft as the option, as opposed to the previous two meetings in Austin where the Hard and Medium compounds were selected.[7]

Team changes

Caterham and Marussia were each granted permission to miss the Grand Prix after both teams were afflicted with long-term financial problems and placed into administration.[8][9] With the grid limited to eighteen cars, the qualifying procedure was revised. Instead of the six slowest cars being eliminated after the first and second rounds, only the slowest four were eliminated. The third and final round of qualifying remained unchanged to determine the final top ten spots on the grid.[10]

DRS

The FIA elected to retain the two DRS zones they used at the previous year's event, with the first being along the backstretch between turns 11 and 12, and the second on the start-finish straight between turns 20 and 1.[11]

Virtual Safety Car (VSC)

After both Friday practice sessions, the FIA tested for the first time this new system, which is in response to minimising the risk of serious accidents and injuries, such as those suffered by Jules Bianchi at the 2014 Japanese Grand Prix. Its aim is to force drivers to reduce their speed by about 35% in an accident zone, with the aid of a dashboard display. Drivers have agreed it is a worthwhile system that, however, requires refinement for further testing at subsequent Grands Prix before introduction in 2015.[12]

Practice and qualifying

"Obviously, Nico did a great job today. I really struggled with braking, yeah. When you look at the brake temperatures, the left brake was always around 100 degrees less than the right front brake. It just kept catching. No matter what I did, even if I braked earlier and tried to save it, it would still lock. So that was perhaps where I was losing a lot of the time. But even if that wasn’t the case I think Nico was perhaps too quick today."

Lewis Hamilton, speaking about his qualifying problems in a post-qualifying press conference.[13]

Three practice sessions were held before the race; two 90 minute sessions on Friday and one lasting an hour on Saturday.[14] Lewis Hamilton was fastest in all three practice sessions, with his teammate Nico Rosberg second fastest in all three sessions.[15][16][17]

Hamilton went fastest in Q1, setting his best time on the soft tyres. Rosberg, who had set his best time on the medium tyres, was second fastest.

Rosberg set the fastest time in Q2. Hamilton was struggling with braking, locking up multiple times on each of his laps and ended the session second fastest.

Rosberg was fastest again in Q3, securing his ninth pole of the season ahead of teammate Hamilton, who again struggled with braking in the third session.[18]

Race

Following the initial pitstop phase, Lewis Hamilton overtook Nico Rosberg at turn 12 on lap 24. Rosberg briefly regained the lead on Hamilton's second stop, but again relinquished the top spot during his own stop. Hamilton would go on to win the race comfortably, with Rosberg four seconds adrift in the runner-up position. Daniel Ricciardo rounded out the podium in what he would describe as "the best possible result" he could achieve after starting the race from 5th and getting off to a slow start on the opening lap. The Williams drivers of Felipe Massa and Valtteri Bottas both ran a fair pace for the entire race, finishing 4th and 5th, respectively.

Fernando Alonso continued to push the Ferrari to its limit, ultimately finishing in 6th place. Sebastian Vettel, having started the race from pit lane, looked to benefit greatly from the opening lap collision between Adrian Sutil and Sergio Pérez, getting into the pits for soft tyres from last place before the safety car held up the front runners. However, he would then immediately switch back to medium tyres on the next lap after running over debris. Vettel would use a late race pitstop for a final set of soft tyres to push his way through the field, setting the fastest lap in the process. Despite pitting four times, he would go on to finish in 7th place after a final lap pass of Kevin Magnussen, who scored McLaren's only points of the race in 8th place. Jean-Éric Vergne made a furious push towards the end of the race, making contact with fellow Frenchman Romain Grosjean under heavy braking into turn 1. Vergne would initially finish the race in 9th place, but had a 5-second penalty added to his time for avoidable contact and forcing Grosjean off track, relegating him to the final points paying position in 10th. This promoted Pastor Maldonado to 9th, scoring his only points of the season in the Lotus.

Post-race

With his victory, Hamilton achieved five consecutive wins for the first time in his career, his tenth win of the season and 32nd Formula One win overall - the most for a British driver in his career, breaking Nigel Mansell's record held since 1994. With Ricciardo finishing third, he became mathematically excluded from winning the Drivers' World Championship; with two races remaining, only Hamilton and Rosberg remained in contention for the title.

Classification

Qualifying

Pos. No. Driver Constructor Q1 Q2 Q3 Grid
1 6 Germany Nico Rosberg Mercedes 1:38.303 1:36.290 1:36.067 1
2 44 United Kingdom Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 1:37.196 1:37.287 1:36.443 2
3 77 Finland Valtteri Bottas Williams-Mercedes 1:38.249 1:37.499 1:36.906 3
4 19 Brazil Felipe Massa Williams-Mercedes 1:37.877 1:37.347 1:37.205 4
5 3 Australia Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull-Renault 1:38.814 1:37.873 1:37.244 5
6 14 Spain Fernando Alonso Ferrari 1:38.349 1:38.010 1:37.610 6
7 22 United Kingdom Jenson Button McLaren-Mercedes 1:38.574 1:38.024 1:37.655 121
8 20 Denmark Kevin Magnussen McLaren-Mercedes 1:38.557 1:38.047 1:37.706 7
9 7 Finland Kimi Räikkönen Ferrari 1:38.669 1:38.263 1:37.804 8
10 99 Germany Adrian Sutil Sauber-Ferrari 1:38.855 1:38.378 1:38.810 9
11 13 Venezuela Pastor Maldonado Lotus-Renault 1:38.608 1:38.467 10
12 11 Mexico Sergio Pérez Force India-Mercedes 1:39.200 1:38.554 11
13 27 Germany Nico Hülkenberg Force India-Mercedes 1:38.931 1:38.598 13
14 26 Russia Daniil Kvyat Toro Rosso-Renault 1:38.936 1:38.699 172
15 25 France Jean-Éric Vergne Toro Rosso-Renault 1:39.250 14
16 21 Mexico Esteban Gutiérrez Sauber-Ferrari 1:39.555 15
17 1 Germany Sebastian Vettel Red Bull-Renault 1:39.621 PL3
18 8 France Romain Grosjean Lotus-Renault 1:39.679 16
107% time: 1:43.999
Source:[19]
Notes

Race

Pos. No. Driver Constructor Laps Time/Retired Grid Points
1 44 United Kingdom Lewis Hamilton Mercedes 56 1:40:04.785 2 25
2 6 Germany Nico Rosberg Mercedes 56 +4.314 1 18
3 3 Australia Daniel Ricciardo Red Bull-Renault 56 +25.560 5 15
4 19 Brazil Felipe Massa Williams-Mercedes 56 +26.924 4 12
5 77 Finland Valtteri Bottas Williams-Mercedes 56 +30.992 3 10
6 14 Spain Fernando Alonso Ferrari 56 +1:35.231 6 8
7 1 Germany Sebastian Vettel Red Bull-Renault 56 +1:35.734 PL 6
8 20 Denmark Kevin Magnussen McLaren-Mercedes 56 +1:40.682 7 4
9 13 Venezuela Pastor Maldonado Lotus-Renault 56 +1:47.870 10 2
104 25 France Jean-Éric Vergne Toro Rosso-Renault 56 +1:48.863 14 1
11 8 France Romain Grosjean Lotus-Renault 55 +1 Lap 16
12 22 United Kingdom Jenson Button McLaren-Mercedes 55 +1 Lap 12
13 7 Finland Kimi Räikkönen Ferrari 55 +1 Lap 8
14 21 Mexico Esteban Gutiérrez Sauber-Ferrari 55 +1 Lap 15
15 26 Russia Daniil Kvyat Toro Rosso-Renault 55 +1 Lap 17
Ret 27 Germany Nico Hülkenberg Force India-Mercedes 16 Engine 13
Ret 11 Mexico Sergio Pérez Force India-Mercedes 1 Collision damage 11
Ret 99 Germany Adrian Sutil Sauber-Ferrari 0 Collision 9
Source:[21]

Notes:

Standings after the race

Drivers' Championship standings
Pos. Driver Points
1 United Kingdom Lewis Hamilton 316
2 Germany Nico Rosberg 292
3 Australia Daniel Ricciardo 214
4 Finland Valtteri Bottas 155
5 Germany Sebastian Vettel 149
Source:[23]

Constructors' Championship standings
Pos. Constructor Points
1 Germany Mercedes 608
2 Austria Red Bull-Renault 363
3 United Kingdom Williams-Mercedes 238
4 Italy Ferrari 196
5 United Kingdom McLaren-Mercedes 147
Source:[23]

References

  1. "United States Grand Prix". Formula1.com. Formula One World Championship Limited. Retrieved 21 October 2014.
  2. McCauley, Kevin. "Inside Formula 1: The best moments from the 2014 U.S. Grand Prix". CultureMap Austin. CultureMap LLC. Retrieved 3 November 2014.
  3. http://www.bizjournals.com/austin/news/2014/11/04/attendance-down-again-at-formula-1.html
  4. "World Motor Sport Council". FIA.com. FIA. 4 December 2013. Retrieved 23 September 2014.
  5. "Lewis Hamilton delivers swashbuckling US Grand Prix victory to move closer to a second drivers’ championship". Daily Telegraph. 2 November 2014. Retrieved 3 November 2014.
  6. "Lewis Hamilton wins 10th race of the season ahead of Nico Rosberg as Mercedes lead United States Grand Prix all the way". Daily Mail. 2 November 2014. Retrieved 3 November 2014.
  7. "Pirelli reveal tyre choices for final three Grands Prix". Formula1.com. Formula One World Championship Limited. 8 October 2014. Retrieved October 25, 2014.
  8. "Caterham 'allowed' to miss US and Brazil GPs by Bernie Ecclestone". bbc.com. BBC. 21 October 2014. Retrieved 24 October 2014.
  9. "Marussia and Caterham to miss US Grand Prix". bbc.com. BBC. 25 October 2014. Retrieved 25 October 2014.
  10. "Qualifying format revised due to Caterham, Marussia absence". Formula1.com. Formula One World Championship Limited. 30 October 2014. Retrieved 30 October 2014.
  11. "United States GP retains two DRS zones". gpupdate.net. JHED Media BV. 26 October 2014. Retrieved 28 October 2014.
  12. "Alonso: Still work to be done on VSC". PlanetF1.com. 31 October 2014. Retrieved 2 November 2014.
  13. "2014 United States Grand Prix - Qualifying Press Conference". FIA. 1 November 2014. Retrieved 21 February 2015.
  14. "2014 Formula One Sporting Regulations" (PDF). FIA.com. Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile. 12 March 2014. Retrieved 21 February 2015.
  15. "2014 Formula 1 United States Grand Prix Results". Formula1.com. Formula One Administration. 31 October 2014. Retrieved 21 February 2015.
  16. "2014 Formula 1 United States Grand Prix Results". Formula1.com. Formula One Administration. 1 November 2014. Retrieved 21 February 2015.
  17. "2014 Formula 1 United States Grand Prix Results". Formula1.com. Formula One Administration. 2 November 2014. Retrieved 21 February 2015.
  18. "Qualifying – rapid Rosberg beats Hamilton to pole". Formula1.com. Formula One World Championship Limited. 1 November 2014. Retrieved 1 November 2014.
  19. 19.0 19.1 19.2 19.3 "2014 United States Grand Prix – Qualifying results". Formula1.com. Formula One World Championship Limited. 1 November 2014. Retrieved 1 November 2014.
  20. "Hamilton seeking another United States GP victory". FoxNews.com. Fox News Network, LLC. 31 October 2014. Retrieved 31 October 2014.
  21. "2014 United States Grand Prix – Race results". Formula1.com. Formula One World Championship Limited. 2 November 2014. Retrieved 2 November 2014.
  22. Collantine, Keith (3 November 2014). "Vergne relegated to 10th by penalty for Grosjean pass". F1 Fanatic (Keith Collantine). Retrieved 3 November 2014.
  23. 23.0 23.1 Collantine, Keith (2014-11-02). "2014 United States Grand Prix championship points". F1 Fanatic (Keith Collantine). Retrieved 2014-11-02.

External links

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