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 catapulted him to P12. He lost the stern alone and ended up lying in the gravel. Team boss Wolff suggested that a problem with the car and not a mistake by the driver was responsible. Despite starting from the pitlane, Russell picked up some points for the team to ensure the team didn't completely lose out in Austin. He managed a long first stint well on the tough tracks and managed to overtake Perez late on to finish sixth – where he would have started had it not been for yesterday's qualifying crash.

Lewis Hamilton, DNF

“I had a great start and thought we were in for a positive race. I was just putting the tires in when I had the accident, which was a really strange moment. I didn't push too hard, but the car was bouncing.” When I turned into turn 19, I lost the rear and that was it. When I turned in there was a strong gust of up to 40km/h which probably didn't help yesterday. We are working hard to analyze both incidents and see what we can learn from them.

“I'm sorry to the entire team who worked so hard to bring these updates, but it goes on and on from here. Hopefully we can move the car to a better location for next week in Mexico. We're all going to work incredibly hard on this.”

READ MORE: 'I've never spun in a race' – Hamilton describes his US GP as 'frustrating' after a rare spin ended the race early

George Russell, 6

“For me, I was happy with how things went today. We didn't know what opportunities the race would bring, but when we came out of the pit lane in sixth place and crossed the finish line ahead of Red Bull, we made the most of it.” We had a difficult situation, especially on the hard tire compound. We were able to extend this first stint and get fresher rubber in the final laps.

“We will work hard in the coming days to analyze the weekend as a whole. The car can still be difficult at times; Lewis doesn't finish races in the gravel trap, as we saw today. If we find its sweet spot, it's capable.” I think the car had the potential to fight for the podium this weekend, but we need to extend its window of use. So we'll try to get back on our feet next weekend in Mexico.

Toto Wolff, Head of Mercedes-Benz Motorsport

“It was a tough weekend overall here in Austin. We see that the car has pace as it showed on Friday and with George in the race today, but we are still struggling with the inconsistency. It's nothing unique.” However, various teams have hit and lost form over the course of the season, but we will work hard to improve in the final five races of the season.

“The positive from today was that George was quick throughout and showed good recovery from his start in the pit lane. The team in the garage worked hard last night to prepare the car for the race and, like us, had a heavy workload to get through.” George ran a strong race and was particularly quick on the hard compound. This allowed us to extend his first stint and secure sixth place in the final laps. He didn't push at all, but a gust of wind combined with the dirty air from the car in front of him and he lost the car. We need to look at that and what happened to George yesterday to understand why the car reacted the way it did. Hamilton is not a driver to lose a car like that on the second lap of a race, so there is something there that we need to understand .”

Andrew Shovlin, Track Technical Director

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

“George made steady progress up the field in his first stint, but it took until half-time before he was clear enough to assess the pace. “Pleasingly the car held on to its tires well and that allowed us to move further forward.” Sixth place was the best he could achieve today and he drove a good race to get there.

“As a team we underperformed over the weekend and are under no illusions that we need to do better. The update kit has shown promise, but we haven't had a single error-free session and we won't know what will happen here. “We could have done it if we had started from the front with a car in our latest aero specification. We will try to answer this question next weekend in Mexico.