Sunday’s USGP marks the 5th anniversary of Formula 1’s return to the United States at Circuit of The Americas, as well as the return of America to the starting grid, with Haas F1 Team racing in front of their home audience.
For Haas F1’s qualifying debut on home soil, Romain Grosjean’s day ended early, landing him P17 in Q1 while teammate Esteban Gutierrez made it to the second qualifying round to place 14th in the session. Both drivers struggled yesterday in practice with mechanical failures to their new front wings and low grip as they tried to optimize their setups for the weekend.
Lewis Hamilton, who trails his teammate Nico Rosberg by 33 points, took his 9th pole position of the season and his first ever at Circuit of the Americas, while besting his teammate by over two tenths of a second. Interestingly, all of Lewis’ victories have come from second on the grid, the only other race winner at Circuit of the Americas being Sebastian Vettel.
PROVISIONAL CLASSIFICATION (#QUALI): HAM beats ROS to #USGP pole, the Red Bulls lead the two Ferraris #F1 pic.twitter.com/rlxA67VOsi
— Formula 1 (@F1) October 22, 2016
Haas F1 Team is currently 8th in the constructor’s championship standings, having scored 28 points and a double points finish at the last race in Japan. Speaking in yesterday’s team principal’s press conference, Red Bull’s Christian Horner commented on Haas F1 Team’s inaugural season:
“I think they’ve had a great first year. First of all, it’s super to have a credible team on the grid. Haas has got a great track record in motorsport in this territory and to come into Formula One is no insignificant challenge so, to have come in, to have come in credibly and efficiently and gone about scoring a good portion of points, being competitive, I think it’s very, very positive.”
Renault team principal Cyril Abiteboul was also complimentary, adding:
“I think they’ve done a great job and in particular because they are ahead of us so they are some form of nightmare to us, to the championship. Mostly, I think it is interesting because they are showing that, as always, the points you are taking at the start of the season are very important.”
This weekend marks the first time an American F1 team has taken part in a Grand Prix weekend in three decades.
