23/10/2023
NEWS STORY
Max Verstappen: "It feels incredible to win my 50th Grand Prix here in Austin, I'm very proud of course but I want to keep pushing for more.
"Starting in P6 today was interesting, I worked my way slowly through to the front. We didn't have a massive pace advantage today and I was struggling with my brakes. I didn't have the same feeling in the car as I did yesterday so that made the race much tougher than anticipated. You could see it was very close at the end and there too. We had to rely on the strategy today and the Team did a great job with that."
Sergio Perez: "I wanted more for today, obviously. At times we had really good pace, but we are still lacking that consistency. It was a hard race, the Ferrari seemed to have improved, but I also think we made a good step from yesterday. It was quite difficult to overtake, especially because the exit of turn 11 was quite tricky as it was very windy and rough over there. We had a few occasions where we could have undercut people, so I think we need to review that as a Team. I think we know what we did wrong across the weekend, so we are really optimistic going into future races. We need to make sure we learn from this weekend as there are some good understandings to make for Mexico. There is a bit more pace in there and I am massively looking forward to my home Grand Prix."
Christian Horner: "Before the race all our simulations were telling us that the two stop was the fastest race for us and that's what we committed to. The debate was, "do we run the hard in the middle stint or the medium?”. We knew going up against Lando that they committed to the two hards so we felt going medium, medium was the best strategy. It was crucial for Max to make use of that, get the pass, take the track position and then run our fastest race to the end of the race. Max was dealing with a brake issue throughout the race, as I'm sure you could hear. It was tough for him and I think his focus was largely on that, although he was able to overcome any issues and bring home the victory. His half century. Another phenomenal achievement for Max. Checo also drove well. He's had some tough races but he had good pace today and I think he'll take a lot of confidence from that. Hopefully that will put him in a good space before his home race next weekend. As all eyes turn to Mexico, we look forward to seeing what's to come and what we can achieve."