For the 13th time ever since its introduction to the calendar, the Circuit of the Americas in Austin welcomes Formula 1, the second race in the USA for this season and second to last to the Vegas Grand Prix further down the year. We are nearing the end of one of F1’s most exciting seasons of this current generation of cars, and the battle for the championship between Red Bull’s Max Verstappen, who is the current reigning world champion, and McLaren’s Lando Norris.

There are many stories coming into this round of the championship, so here are the main ones in order to catch up if you’re feeling lost, whether because you’re new, or because you haven’t been able to catch up.

• Daniel Ricciardo dropped in favor of Liam Lawson
  • VCARB, Red Bull’s junior team, decided to lay down the 8 time race winner for the rookie Liam Lawson, who coincidentally was also Ricciardo’s replacement for when he was out on injury for 2023, replacing him for 3 races on which he scored points.
  • The drop comes after several weeks of rumors that Ricciardo was set to replace Red Bull’s struggling Sergio Perez and be elevated to the top seat, but Ricciardo has so far failed to impress the higher ups at the championship winning team and was dropped at the last round in Singapore
  • Ricciardo was visibly emotional, and set the fastest lap at the end of the race, a “gift” by his team as a goodbye ceremony. The action has however risen discussion on regards to the relation of VCARB and Red Bull, with McLaren saying that Red Bull is using its development team as a tool in the fight for the championship.
• Sergio Perez’s future remains uncertain
  • As the Mexican’s home race approaches, his future has been put into question
  • Perez has failed to score points twice this year, and has not breached the top five in any race since the Miami Grand Prix at the start of the year, and has also failed to qualify for Q3 (The qualifying session that decides the starting order in the top 10) over 5 times the season
  • While Perez has dismissed both sacking and retirement accusations thrown his way over the last few months, and even with a confirmation from Red Bull themselves of them planning on keeping Perez, his future at the teams remains in doubt.
  • Red Bull has given up on their chase of the constructor’s championship this year, title who they’ve lost severely due to Perez’ lackluster year so far.
  • While the team have admitted that they’ve made several mistakes with the development and apologized to Perez, the Mexican driver’s mistakes against younger driver and VCARB member Yuki Tsunoda’s excellent driving throughout the season puts pressure on him to step up his game. Red Bull has had a reputation of discarding contracts over results less dire before.
• Lando Norris cuts down distance to Verstappen with 6 rounds to go
  • Max Verstappen arrives to Austin with a 52 point lead on Lando Norris, however with the under performing RB20 and struggling to keep it on the top 5 consistently, the buffer to Norris might not be enough until the end of the year
  • Thanks to Ricciardo’s last fastest lap attempt at Singapore, which stole the point from Norris and McLaren, Verstappen should attempt to finish second on all remaining races to keep his lead.
  • Verstappen has become increasingly critical of his own team during the last few months, calling for them to fix the failing upgrades that have put them behind both McLaren and Ferrari, and on similar foot to Mercedes, a team who has failed to be a real menace for the title since 2022 with their failed car concept.
  • Norris comes from a dominant victory as Singapore, having lead every single lap and taken the victory by over 20 seconds. However his race was riddled with mistakes that landed him in tricky situations and could have seen him crash out of the race. Norris has been criticized by former champion Nico Rosberg on his mentality, saying he has not showed one of a champion on his challenge to dethrone Verstappen.

If you still wish to go to the Austin Grand Prix, there are still tickets on sale!