In Austin, Button was surprisingly knocked out in Q1 since he could not find clear track and was delayed by Jolyon Palmer's Renault on the final corner which caught him off-guard, while Alonso was knocked out in Q2 and managed to qualify 12th, despite the car seemingly returning to competitiveness. McLaren nonetheless still delivered a 4th double points finish of the season, with Alonso benefiting from a Virtual Safety Car to make a free pit-stop and therefore matched his best finish of 5th since rejoining McLaren and for 2016, after late overtakes on both Massa and Sainz, despite colliding with Massa which caused Massa to suffer a puncture. Button again finished 9th, after a great 1st lap which saw him rise from 19th to 11th. The weekend was pretty encouraging for McLaren as they had endured difficult times at their engine supplier's home race in Japan, only for them to slip outside the points again in Mexico with 12th and 13th place for Button and Alonso respectively.