Carlos Sainz delivered a standout performance in the United States Grand Prix sprint race at the Circuit of the Americas, securing second place after a series of battles with teammate Charles Leclerc. He also made a late charge to capitalise on Lando Norris’ final-lap mistake.
Starting from fifth, Sainz quickly found himself in the thick of the action. The opening laps were packed with wheel-to-wheel duels, particularly with Leclerc, who initially defended on three occasions. However, Sainz saw his opportunity on lap 5, diving down the inside of Leclerc at Turn 15 to take fourth position. From there, the Spaniard set his sights on Russell and the podium places as the Mercedes cooked its tyres.
Reflecting on the start to the race, Sainz said, “Honestly they were very fun battles.”
“Yeah, a good sprint, I think if the sprints are like this, you always enjoy them, that little bit of extra action. Yeah, we had a lot of battles, especially the first five laps, a lot going on.”
Sainz’s patience and race craft paid off when, on lap nine, he overtook Russell to move into third place. His Ferrari teammate Leclerc followed close behind, with the pair looking set to settle in behind Norris for the remainder of the race.
As Norris struggled with his medium tyres, Sainz sensed an opportunity. When Norris locked up into Turn 1 on the final lap, Sainz pounced, seizing second place and managing to hold off his rivals until the chequered flag.
“Towards the end, I was starting to struggle with the tyres, but I saw Lando also struggling, and I thought that if I could get into DRS, I would have my chance to finish in P2. And yeah, we made it stick at Turn 1, and yeah, it was a fun one,” Sainz explained.
Sainz was pleased with Ferrari’s pace, particularly as tyre management was not a key focus during the sprint due to the number of on-track fights.
“Well, the reality is that we didn’t manage much with the tyres because we were in so many battles the whole time that we couldn’t really actually focus on tyre management too much,” he said.
Encouraged by the performance, Sainz believes Ferrari could be strong in Sunday’s main race as well, saying, “And even though we did that, our pace was still quite decent, so it’s encouraging to see that maybe for tomorrow we have a good chance.
“I think anyway in qualifying our car is still not in the best place, but we will try and qualify as far ahead as possible.”
