2022 American Grand Prix

The **2022 United States Grand Prix** was a Formula 1.5 motor race, held on October 23, 2022, at the Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas, United States. The race was the 19th round of the 2022 Formula 1.5 World Championship and the 51st running of the United States Grand Prix, the 43rd time the race was run as a World Championship event since the inaugural 1950 season, and the tenth time a World Championship round was held at the Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas.

## Background

The event was held across the weekend of October 21–23. It was the nineteenth round of the 2022 Formula 1.5 World Championship.

### Championship Standings before the race

Going in to this weekend, Lando Norris led by 32 points from Esteban Ocon and Fernando Alonso, third, by 72. Alpine led the Constructors' Championship from McLaren by 71 points and Aston Martin by 222 points.

### Entrants

The drivers and teams were the same as the season entry list with no additional stand-in drivers for the race. Four drivers took part in FP1, three of which were making the F1.5 Practice debut. Logan Sargeant replaced Nicholas Latifi at Williams, Theo Pourchaire replaced Bottas at Alfa Romeo, Alex Palou replaced Daniel Ricciardo at McLaren, and finally Antonio Giovinazzi replaced Magnussen at Haas.

### Tyres

Tyre supplier Pirelli brought the C2, C3, and C4 tyre compounds (designated hard, medium, and soft, respectively) for teams to use at the event.

## Practice

FP1 was held on Friday with Lance Stroll topping the session ahead of Fernando Alonso and Pierre Gasly. The session was red flagged early on when Giovinazzi crashed into the barriers, ending his session early. FP2 was a Pirelli tyre test for the upcoming 2023 season, with strict rules meaning most drivers could not run representive lap times, only those drivers who missed FP1 due to giving the car up to a rookie driver were allowed to use 2022 spec tyres. Because of that Bottas topped the session with Ricciardo P2 and Schumacher P3. The third and final FP session was topped by Alonso ahead of Vettel and Stroll.

## Qualifying

Lance Stroll took his fourth career pole in Qualifying, and his first since the 2020 Turkish Grand Prix. Aston Martin took their first pole position since they returned to the sport at the start of 2021.

## Race

Early on in the race Stroll took a commanding lead, whilst Vettel worked his way up to 2nd by the end of lap 1, gaining 4 positions. Stroll pitted on lap 15 for fresh tyres, just two laps later on lap 17 Bottas span out and beached his Alfa Romeo in the gravel trap. This brought out the saftey car which saw Vettel jump Stroll for the lead. The race restarted on lap 21, Vettel pulled away from the pack whilst Alonso passed Gasly and was battling Stroll for 2nd when they collided, which saw Stroll retire from the race and Alonso's Alpine going flying into the air. Alonso kept it going though and carried on, however another safety car had just been deployed. Alonso worked his way up to finsh 2nd on the road however was later penalised. Magnussen lost his position on the final lap to Sebastian Vettel.

After the race Haas protested to the stewards that Alpine left Alonso out after the Stroll crash with a damaged and dangerous car. The FIA and stewards excepted the protest and summoned Alpine. After the hearing the FIA agreed with Haas, that Alonso was left out with a dangerous car when only driving with one mirror, and was given a 30 second time penalty to drop Alonso from 2nd to 10th. Public reaction to this was that they understood why Haas submitted a protest as they had been black and orange flagged by the FIA (A flag given by the FIA to say a driver must pit as the car is unsafe and needs to be repaired) multiple times in the season, however the FIA said Alonso's car passed the legal tests and didn't black and orange flag Alonso during the race, which means it was an FIA mess up. After the stewards ruling, Alpine announced they would appeal the decision as Haas lodged the protest after the deadline allowed. The FIA has a meeting to review the appeal on the thursday at the next in Mexico.

## Championship Standings after the race

Drivers' Championship standings

;Constructors' Championship standings

## External Links

1. ↑  Fernando Alonso received a five-place grid penalty for exceeding his quota of power unit elements.
2. ↑  Zhou Guanyu received a five-place grid penalty for exceeding his quota of power unit elements.
3. ↑  Yuki Tsunoda received a five-place grid penalty for a new gearbox driveline
4. ↑  Esteban Ocon qualified 12th, but he was required to start the race from the back of the grid for exceeding his quota of power unit elements. The new power unit elements were changed while the car was under parc fermé without the permission of the technical delegate. He was therefore required to start the race from the pit lane.
5. ↑  Fernando Alonso finished 2nd on track, but he received a post race ten-second stop and go penalty converted into a 30-second time penalty for a technical infringement. This was later reverted.
6. ↑  Includes one point for fastest lap.
7. ↑  Albon received a five-second time penalty for leaving the track and gaining an advantage.
8. ↑  Pierre Gasly finished 6th, but he received a ten-second time penalty for failing to serve a penalty following a safety car infringement.
9. ↑  Mick Schumacher finished 10th, but he received a five-second time penalty for exceeding track limits.
10. ↑  Nicholas Latifi received a five-second time penalty for causing a collision with Mick Schumacher. His final position was not affected by the penalty.