The United States Grand Prix - did you know?

The only American driver on the grid

Did you know that Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel are the only current drivers to have won in the USA, or that the Circuit of The Americas is one of just four anticlockwise tracks on the calendar? Ahead of the 2015 Formula 1 United States Grand Prix in Austin, we present some of the more obscure facts and figures about the race...

The Circuit of The Americas (COTA) in Austin, Texas is one of the most undulating tracks on the calendar, with a difference of 30.9m between the highest point (Turn 1, 157.4m above sea level) and the lowest point (between Turns 19 and 20, 126.5m above sea level).

This year's race is the fourth to be held at COTA. It is one of just four anticlockwise circuits on the calendar (the others are Singapore, Abu Dhabi and Brazil).

Austin is the sixth venue to have hosted the United States Grand Prix following Sebring (1959), Riverside (1960), Watkins Glen (1961-80), Phoenix (1989-91) and Indianapolis (2000-07). Of course, Indianapolis also plays host to the Indy 500 which was a round of the F1 world championship between 1950 and 1960.

A further four American venues have hosted rounds of the world championship under different race titles. They are Long Beach (1976-83), Las Vegas (1981-82), Detroit (1982-88) and Dallas (1984).
American drivers have won 33 rounds of the world championship (the tenth highest total for any nationality) - yet an American has never won the United States Grand Prix. However, US racing legend Mario Andretti did win the United States Grand Prix West at Long Beach in 1977.

Alexander Rossi will be the only American on the grid for this year's race. The Californian is the 152nd American to have started a world championship event, but only the 48th to have started a Grand Prix (the other 104 only took part in the Indy 500 between 1950 and 1960).

Statistically the most successful driver in United States Grand Prix history is Michael Schumacher with five victories. Jim Clark, Graham Hill and last year's Austin winner Lewis Hamilton all have three wins on American soil.

Aside from Hamilton (who won at Indianapolis in 2007 and COTA in 2012 and 2014), the only other current driver to have won in America is Sebastian Vettel, who took victory in Austin in 2013. Six other members of the grid have US podiums to their names - Felipe Massa, Fernando Alonso, Kimi Raikkonen, Romain Grosjean, Daniel Ricciardo and Nico Rosberg.

In terms of manufacturers, Ferrari have the best record in United States Grand Prix history with nine victories. However, the Scuderia are yet to triumph at COTA, with McLaren (2012), Red Bull (2013) and Mercedes (2014) taking the spoils in the three races to date.

If he finishes nine points ahead of Sebastian Vettel and two points ahead of team mate Nico Rosberg, Hamilton will become the first British driver in F1 history to claim back-to-back world titles. Moreover, he will become just the second British driver in history (after Jackie Stewart) - and the 10th all-time - to score three or more world championship crowns.

Hamilton has won nine races so far this season, and he'll need to win the remaining four if he wants to match Sebastian Vettel's single season record of 13 victories, set in 2013.

Vettel, incidentally, holds the lap record in Austin, going round in 1m 39.347s in the 2012 race. The German, who made his F1 debut in the United States in 2007, also claimed the first of his two successive United States pole positions in 2012. Nico Rosberg is the only other man to have taken pole in Austin.

And finally, Sauber will celebrate their 400th Grand Prix in the United States. Their first was the South African Grand Prix in 1993, and since then they have claimed one win, 26 podium finishes, one pole position, five fastest laps and 808 points. Will they add to that tally in Austin?

(source: f1.com)

1982 USA Caesars Palace GP - Full Race

This is the race were Keke Rosberg won the championship. I am sorry that it's not in english.

2015 Russian GP Sochi (Full Race)

MiniDrivers - Chapter 7x15 - 2015 Russian Grand Prix

Sochi stats - Mercedes seal back-to-back constructors’ titles

It was a case of déjà vu at Sochi on Sunday as Mercedes wrapped up a second successive constructors’ title on Russian soil.

With Nico Rosberg retiring and Ferrari claiming second and fifth behind Lewis Hamilton’s victorious Silver Arrow, it had initially looked like Mercedes would have to wait until the United States Grand Prix (or later) to seal the crown.

But with the stewards subsequently handing Kimi Raikkonen a ten-second stop and go penalty for his last-lap clash with Williams’ Valtteri Bottas, dropping the Ferrari driver to eighth, Mercedes eventually scored 25 points to the Prancing Horse's 22, giving them the three points they needed to clinch the title with four races to go.

“What an incredible moment for Mercedes-Benz!” said Dr. Dieter Zetsche, Chairman of the Board of Management of Daimler AG and Head of Mercedes-Benz Cars. “Congratulations to our team in Brackley and Brixworth who have worked so hard to make this achievement possible.

“After winning in 2014, we raised the bar again to secure this year’s title, and we needed to because our rivals gave us plenty of headaches as they stepped up their performance.

“We have two exceptional sportsmen at the wheel, Lewis and Nico, and a fantastic team behind the scenes, who have delivered 12 wins in 15 races so far this year. Their work has made every employee of Mercedes-Benz a world champion and we are very proud of them.”

Hamilton’s victory was his second in a row in Russia, his ninth win of the season and his 42nd career triumph, moving him level with Sebastian Vettel for third on the all-time list. The Briton now stands on the verge of becoming the first British driver in F1 history to claim back-to-back world titles, and can close out his third championship crown by outscoring Vettel by nine points and Rosberg by two points in the United States.

Second place not only lifted Vettel into second in the drivers' standings, it also gave the Ferrari driver his 11th podium finish of the season, which, somewhat surprisingly, is more than he scored in his 2010 and 2012 title-winning campaigns.

Behind the German, Sergio Perez benefitted from Raikkonen and Bottas’s tangle to score his - and Force India’s - first rostrum since last year’s Bahrain Grand Prix. The Mexican, who has scored points in four of the last five races, now has five career podium finishes to his name – the 11th most amongst active drivers.

Elsewhere, Felipe Massa took advantage of Valtteri Bottas’ late misfortune to finish fourth and close to within two points of his Williams team mate in the drivers’ standings. Home favourite Daniil Kvyat meanwhile leapfrogged Red Bull partner Daniel Ricciardo by finishing fifth.

Just behind the Russian, Sauber’s Felipe Nasr recorded his best result since the season-opener in Australia with sixth. The Brazilian has now scored points in two of the last three races, having earlier this season endured a six-race barren streak.

Further back, Lotus’s Pastor Maldonado equalled his best finish of the year by finishing seventh for the third time this season, while McLaren’s Jenson Button finished in the points for just the third time in 2015. The Woking team looked to have got both of their cars home in the top ten for just the second time this year, but after the race Fernando Alonso was hit with a 5-second time penalty for failing to respect track limits.

That lifted Toro Rosso’s Max Verstappen into the points for the third race in a row and the seventh time this year.

(source: f1.com)

Pirelli confirm tyre allocation for Mexico City

Announcing their tyre nominations for the final four rounds of the 2015 season, Pirelli have confirmed that their medium and soft compounds will be used for Mexico’s return to the F1 calendar next month.

Pirelli’s simulation data has indicated these will be the best choice for the recently revamped Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez, which will host the Formula 1 Gran Premio de Mexico 2015 on November 1.

The same compounds will be used for the preceding race in the United States on October 25, the allocation for the Circuit of The Americas in Austin being unchanged from last season.

The season’s penultimate round in Brazil will also have the medium and soft tyres, as in 2014. These should suit the hot conditions of Interlagos and provide a range of strategy options of between two and three pit stops for most teams.

Finally, Pirelli’s soft and supersoft compounds have been selected for Abu Dhabi: again, the same selection as 2014, on a smooth and varied circuit that the teams know well from previous testing.

At a glance - 2015 tyre compounds:

Australia - soft, medium
Malaysia - hard, medium
China - soft, medium
Bahrain - soft, medium
Spain - medium, hard
Monaco - supersoft, soft
Canada - supersoft, soft
Austria - supersoft, soft
Great Britain – medium, hard
Hungary – soft, medium
Belgium - soft, medium
Italy - soft, medium
Singapore - supersoft, soft
Japan - medium, hard
Russia - supersoft, soft
United States - soft, medium
Mexico - soft, medium
Brazil - soft, medium
Abu Dhabi - supersoft, soft

(source: f1.com)

Winners and Losers - Russia

A second consecutive constructors’ crown for Mercedes and a first 2015 podium for Sergio Perez made them definite winners in Sochi, while technical woes for Nico Rosberg and a late-race mauling for Valtteri Bottas put them among the losers. But what of the rest of the field? We take a team-by-team look back on Sunday’s 2015 Formula 1 Russian Grand Prix…


Mercedes

Lewis Hamilton, P1
Nico Rosberg, Retired lap 7, throttle

Losing Rosberg to a throttle problem on the seventh lap, after he had led confidently from the start, seemed like a serious blow to Mercedes’ hopes of cementing a second consecutive constructors’ world championship. But Hamilton controlled the race even with a rear wing problem which made his F1 W06 Hybrid behave a little oddly in the second half, and enabled Vettel to push him to the finish. It was his ninth win of the season, and brought him equal with Vettel’s career total of 42.

The podium celebrations were over, and Niki Lauda and Toto Wolff had rushed to the airport, when the stewards confirmed the 30s time penalty that dropped Raikkonen from fifth to eighth and took away six points from Ferrari’s score of 28. That meant that Mercedes had scored the three points more than the Scuderia that they needed to put things beyond reach with four races remaining, thus securing the title after all.


Ferrari

Sebastian Vettel, P2
Kimi Raikkonen, P8

After Vettel had won an intra-team battle with Raikkonen he was able to push hard enough to get the overcut on Bottas, whose tyres did not last as long. That set him up to push very hard on the soft tyre and to keep Hamilton honest as the Briton struggled with a rear wing problem. His strong second place lifted him to second in the drivers’ championship, following Rosberg’s misfortune. Raikkonen said he lacked straight-line speed and he spent a lot of time bottled up behind slower cars. His move on Bottas on the final lap was adjudged optimistic by the stewards, who gave him a 30s time penalty that dropped him from a battered fifth to eighth.


Force India

Sergio Perez, P3
Nico Hulkenberg, Retired lap 1, accident

Force India hoped for big things with sixth and seventh on the grid, but it all went wrong when Hulkenberg spun on cold tyres in Turn 2 on the opening lap. An opportunistic pit stop under the safety car on lap 12 set Perez up for a great run, however. The Mexican babied his tyres while keeping ahead of Ricciardo, Bottas and Raikkonen, until he succumbed to the latter pair on the final lap. After they collided, though, he regained a richly deserved podium place.


Williams

Felipe Massa, P4
Valtteri Bottas, P12

Williams so deserved a podium with Bottas, even though he had to pit much earlier from second place than either of the Ferraris which were chasing him. Held up in traffic as a result, he lost second to Vettel and was under heavy threat from Raikkonen right up until the final lap, when the elder Finn crashed into him and took him out. Massa, meanwhile, ran soft tyres at the start and was then flying on the supersofts towards the end, when he clawed his way to fourth after a strong performance. It was some consolation, but not much.


Red Bull

Daniil Kvyat, P5
Daniel Ricciardo, Retired lap 48, suspension

Kvyat thought he got everything out of his Red Bull on his way to a popular fifth in front of his home crowd, while Ricciardo’s was one of the performances of the race as, like Perez, he pitted on the 12th lap and then nursed his tyres all the way through to the 48th lap when he had to stop with suspension problems. Points were definitely on the cards.


Sauber

Felipe Nasr, P6
Marcus Ericsson, Retired lap 1, accident

Like Force India, Sauber lost a car on the opening lap when Ericsson could not avoid the stricken Hulkenberg. But Nasr drove a very strong race to take sixth, and give Sauber some much-needed points that put them even further out of McLaren’s reach.


Lotus

Pastor Maldonado, P7
Romain Grosjean, Retired lap 12, accident

Lotus lost Grosjean early when he got off line on the marbles in Turn 3 and crashed heavily, but fortunately without injury. Maldonado struggled in the latter half after switching the softs on which he had opted to start for the supersofts.


McLaren

Jenson Button, P9
Fernando Alonso, P11

For a while it seemed that McLaren had scored another double points finish, but then Alonso got dropped from 10th to 11th by a five-second penalty for disrespecting track limits in Turn 16. He had been beaten in open warfare by Button, who pushed as hard as he could in a car that was still fodder for any other on the straights.


Toro Rosso

Max Verstappen, P10
Carlos Sainz, Retired lap 46, brakes

Verstappen’s race was compromised right from the get-go when he was the innocent victim of Hulkenberg’s spin. He got tapped into the wall by the rotating Force India, puncturing his left-rear tyre and inflicting damage which hampered him to the finish. But the ray of light was 10th place after Alonso was penalised.

Sainz bravely insisted on racing and was as feisty as ever despite his 46g impact the previous morning. He was in the running for points when his brakes cried enough, and two spins sent him to the pits to retire. Like Bottas, he deserved better.


Marussia

Roberto Merhi, P13
Will Stevens, P14

Yet again Marussia got both cars home, Merhi was happy with his return to the cockpit, but Stevens was annoyed to lose position during the first safety-car period and then to flat-spot his tyres, requiring another stop, after the second.

(source: f1.com)