What the teams said – Race day at the 2024 United States Grand Prix

Mercedes

Hamilton had an unusual spin early on after a great start had lifted him to P12. He lost the rear by himself and got beached in the gravel, with team boss Wolff indicating a car issue rather than driver error was to blame. Russell did pick up some points for the team despite starting from the pit lane, to ensure they didn’t lose out completely in Austin. He made a long first stint on the hards work well and managed to overtake Perez late on to finish sixth – which is where he would have started, but for that qualifying crash yesterday.

Lewis Hamilton, DNF

“I had a great start, and I thought we were in for a positive race. I was just bringing the tyres in when I had the accident, which was a really strange moment. I wasn’t pushing too hard but the car bounced a little into turn 19, I lost the back end and that was that. We measured a large gust of wind, up to 40 kph, as I turned in which likely didn’t help. George had a similar spin to me yesterday so we will work hard to analyse both incidents and see what we can learn from them.

“I am sorry to the whole team who have worked so hard to bring these updates but onwards and upwards from here. Hopefully we can get the car in a better place for next week in Mexico. We will all be working incredibly hard to do so.”

READ MORE: ‘I’ve never spun in the race before’ – Hamilton brands his US GP ‘frustrating’ after rare spin ends race early

George Russell, 6th

“I was pleased with how today went from my side. We didn’t know what the race would bring in terms of opportunities but going from the pit lane to P6, and finishing ahead of Red Bull, meant that we made the best of a difficult situation. We had good pace throughout, in particular on the Hard compound tyre. We were able to extend that first stint and give ourselves fresher rubber with which to attack in the closing laps.

“We will work hard in the coming days to analyse the weekend as a whole. The car can still be tricky at times; Lewis doesn’t end races in the gravel as we saw today. When we find its sweet spot, it is capable of strong performances but that is difficult to deliver consistently. I think the car had the potential to fight for the podium this weekend, but we need to widen its operating window. We will therefore be looking to bounce back next weekend in Mexico.”

Toto Wolff, Head of Mercedes-Benz Motorsport

“It has been a tough weekend overall here in Austin. We see that there is pace in the car, as was shown on Friday and with George in the race today, but we are still dealing with its inconsistency. That is not something unique to us though. Different teams have come into and out of form throughout the season, but it is something we will be working hard to improve over the final five races of the season.

“The positive from today was that George was quick throughout and produced a good fightback from his pit lane start. The team in the garage worked hard last night to get the car ready for the race, with a large workload to get through as we had to revert on specification. George drove a strong race and was particularly quick on the Hard compound. That enabled us to extend his first stint and ultimately claim P6 in the final few laps. Unfortunately, it was a disappointing day for Lewis. He wasn’t pushing at all but a gust of wind, combined with the dirty air from the car ahead, and he lost the car. We need to look at that, and what happened with George yesterday, to understand why the car reacted like that. Lewis Hamilton is not a driver that loses a car like that on lap two of a race, so there is something there that we need to understand.”

Andrew Shovlin, Trackside Engineering Director

“Given that we had one car starting at the back and one in the pit lane, we had realistic expectations as to what could be achieved today. Lewis made a good start and was quickly up to P12. Unfortunately, that didn’t last long as he lost the rear in turn 19. We’re still investigating what caused that, but in any case, his race was over.

“George was making steady progress through the field in his first stint, but it still took him until the halfway point to get any clear air to judge pace. Encouragingly, the car was hanging on to its tyres well and that was allowing us to extend. P6 was the best he could have achieved today, and he drove a good race to get there.

“As a team we have underachieved across the weekend and are under no illusions that we need to do better. The update kit has shown some promise, but we’ve not had a single clean session, and we’ll leave here not knowing what we could have done if we’d started near the front with a car in our latest aero specification. We will look to answer that question next weekend in Mexico.”