United States Grand Prix – Racing Point’s Sergio Perez claimed the final points scoring position in the US, despite crossing the line in P11.
Sergio Perez claimed P10 and the final point available in the United States; a tremendous recovery after starting from the pitlane.
The Racing Point driver was given a penalty to start from the pits after Friday practice. Having missed a signal to come into the FIA weighbridge during FP2, Perez proceeded to his pit box and went through a dummy pitstop. Despite the same wheels being fitted to the car during the stop, his car was viewed as being ‘worked on’ and, as a result, he was given an automatic pitlane start penalty.
As a result of that, Racing Point opted to fit him out with some new engine components – namely a new engine, turbo, MGU-H and MGU-K.
Starting on a fresh set of Mediums, Perez ran a long first stint to get to Lap 24 before pitting to swap to the Hards. It was an effective one stop strategy, having risen as high as P8 before his stop.
Late on the brakes from Giovinazzi and Perez down to the hairpin at Turn 11 👀
And @SChecoPerez roars past on his way to a P10 finish from a pit lane start 👏#USGP 🇺🇸 #F1 pic.twitter.com/R3cYvdhFfr
— Formula 1 (@F1) November 4, 2019
Towards the end of the race, Perez looked as though he might finish in P9 but fell down to P11 on the final lap as Toro Rosso’s Daniil Kvyat elbowed his way past in the final sector of the lap.
However, Kvyat’s move was seen as too rambunctious and he was given a penalty for the incident. The resulting five second time loss moved Perez back up into P10 – a point that means Racing Point are in P6 in the Constructor’s Championship with two races remaining.
“We had a tremendous race today and we managed to recover well as a team.” smiled Perez after the race. “We used a very aggressive one-stop strategy and had good pace all afternoon. On the final lap, Kvyat crashed into me and damaged my front wing, but he was penalised and we took back the tenth place. One point means we move up to sixth place in the Constructors’ Championship, which is important with two races to go. It’s only a point today, but every point will count at the end of the season.”
Team boss Otmar Szafnauer said: “Seeing Sergio race from the pit lane to a points finish is a satisfying end to a challenging afternoon. It wasn’t easy to make the one-stop race work, but Sergio did a fantastic job to look after the Hard tyres and maintain good pace for 31 laps. Things got a bit messy on the final lap when Kvyat made contact, but justice prevailed as the stewards reinstated Sergio into a well-deserved tenth place.”
