Get ready everyone, the United States is about to take center stage in the Formula 1 championship battles.
A four-week gap since the last race in Singapore has really whet the appetite for racing to return this weekend in Austin, but itโs not just the long wait that means youโre going to want to pay attention to the way the United States Grand Prix plays out.
During the summer break there wasnโt a huge amount of expectation that we were going to get a driversโ championship fight this season, but McLarenโs increasingly strong performance has been paired with strong driver showings and Lando Norris has outscored Max Verstappen at each of the four races since the August shutdown.
His biggest points swing in each of those events is eight โ achieved with a win and the fastest lap in Zandvoort, and third place with the fastest lap to Verstappenโs sixth in Monza. Another dominant victory last time out in Singapore meant Norris only took seven points out of Verstappen, after Daniel Ricciardoโs final act was to score a fastest lap and take the extra point off the McLaren driver.
Verstappen has done a really good job of limiting the damage by finishing second to Norris on the two occasions the Briton has disappeared into the distance, and can perhaps count himself a little fortunate that a bigger chunk of points weren’t taken out of his advantage in Baku. But the trend has been clear, as McLaren has moved into the lead of the constructorsโ standings.
Given the way the season started, itโs remarkable that Verstappen hasnโt won in eight races, a run stretching back to the Spanish Grand Prix in June. And while he might have prevented Norris from significantly reducing his lead in one go over the past four rounds, the average gain per weekend โ 6.5 points โ would be enough over the next five rounds to force a title decider in Abu Dhabi.
In many ways, the break in races came at the perfect time for Red Bull. McLaren was building real momentum, and although there were signs of progress at the last two races, the race pace difference was still far too big for Verstappen to trouble Norris.
But this wasnโt a shutdown period, so teams could work flat out to try and understand their performance issues and seek improvements. Without any fear of car damage being accrued โ because there were no races โ the manufacturing capacity could be allocated without the potential demand for last-minute spares.
So teams were able to plan out their development schedules to target an upgrade for Austin this year, as the visit to Circuit of the Americas will kick off a run of six races in eight weeks to complete the 2024 season.
As late in the year as it is, that still makes up a quarter of the entire season, so thereโs significant value in any new parts that can be delivered to the cars this weekend.
McLaren goes into the final rounds of the season with the momentum. Andy Hone/Motorsport Images
Red Bull is looking to resolve the balance issues that have become increasingly prominent as the season has gone on, and team principal Christian Horner said after the Singapore Grand Prix that the team had identified a development direction that it could work towards ahead of the next race.
But McLaren is not standing still either, with Andrea Stella admitting he wonโt let the fear of updating such a strong car hold back its own plans. If McLaren has shown a particular strength over the rest of the field this year, it has been its ability to add new parts and have them work as intended, while Red Bull, Ferrari and Mercedes all going through phases of problem solving.
How it plays out between the two teams is going to be crucial. COTA is a track that should suit Red Bull a little more than some of the recent layouts, and an upgrade could put it back in the mix for victory. But if McLaren is able to retain the performance advantage it has held since the summer break, then the title fight is well and truly on.
Mexico City and Interlagos should be venues where McLaren is strong, while Mercedes and Ferrari continue to show peaks and troughs that make at least one of them a threat at the front on most weekends. They will both also have upgrades of their own at COTA that could further impact the competitive picture.
The margins have been so small that there are so many potential outcomes in terms of relative performance this weekend. They range from Red Bull having a race-winning car again and McLaren facing threats from Ferrari and Mercedes, to McLaren retaining an advantage and Red Bull slipping to the fourth fastest car. Or many variances in between.
As the likely last major update for all of the teams, though, COTA will largely set the competitive order for the rest of the season, with the usual fluctuations based on circuit characteristics still to factor in.
With the Sprint format also offering a further eight points up to the race winner, if Norris has a quicker package than Verstappen at his disposal then he has every chance of taking the championship battle right to the wire, and a big swing in points would go at least some of the way towards even making him the favorite.
But if Red Bull is able to erase the performance deficit that it has been dealing with over the past few months, then it will have a chance of halting the momentum that McLaren and Norris have been enjoying. In that scenario, not only would Verstappen have the ability to snuff out any threat to his driversโ championship lead, but McLarenโs 41-point advantage in the constructorsโ championship could look more fragile, too.
And yet, on top of all that, there is still the added caveat of just one practice session potentially leading to teams getting their set-ups wrong, and not being able to extract the full performance capabilities out of their cars.
The time for waiting, though, is nearly over, and the direction of the championship battles this season will quickly be set when COTA kicks off the triple-header.
