Hamilton outduels Rosberg in Mercedes romp

Lewis Hamilton

Lewis Hamilton made it five consecutive victories for the first time in his career and extended his lead in the Formula 1 world championship to a commanding 24 points by beating main rival Nico Rosberg to victory in the US Grand Prix.

The two Mercedes drivers were once again in a class of their own.

Rosberg will be ruing another failure to convert from pole position, with only two of his four victories this season having come when he started on pole. In the first stint he pulled out what appeared a comfortable three second lead but Hamilton closed the gap after the stop and pulled off a good move in to T12 to take a lead he would not relinquish.

Nico Rosberg has revealed that an ERS error was key to allowing Hamilton to overtake him for victory at the United States Grand Prix.

"I made a mistake because I used the wrong thing to get more KERS," said Rosberg, when asked by AUTOSPORT about the move.

"When I saw him coming I decided to go for extra boost but I never got it.

"I thought I was using the right thing, but there was a delay in that one.

"If I did it with a button it would be immediate, but with a switch there is a delay, so I never got the extra KERS.

"I had a big drop off, which is why in the last meters he got a good jump on me.

"So, that was a mistake that I didn't know about."

Behind the two Mercedes – who took their tenth one-two result of the season – was Daniel Ricciardo who recovered from a poor start to beat the two Williams drivers in the battle for the final podium position.

Lewis Hamilton

Fernando Alonso finished sixth, but was over a minute behind Valtteri Bottas in fifth, while Sebastian Vettel recovered from a pit lane start to take seventh place after a late charge on soft tires that saw him finish just 0.5s shy of Alonso.

The Williams drivers finished fourth and fifth, Felipe Massa coming home ahead of team-mate Valtteri Bottas after jumping him at the start.

Ricciardo's Red Bull team-mate Sebastian Vettel gambled on a pitlane start and low-downforce settings, after exceeding the five-engines-per-season limit at this race.

The reigning world champion found it difficult to make progress initially, but climbed as high as sixth before being passed by Alonso's Ferrari (on a much fresher and softer set of tires) in the closing stages.

Vettel then dropped to 14th place after making a late stop for fresh rubber, but recovered back to seventh as the cars ahead battled to the end on much older rubber.

QUOTES

Lewis Hamilton
What an incredible place this is to go racing. We have such great support here and I have to say a massive thanks to the fans who have been awesome all weekend. I'm really grateful to have had the opportunity to be out front here. It's a very special feeling to have such an amazing car, an amazing team and to be on this incredible run. It's been an unbelievable job from the team all year so a big thanks to everyone here at the track and at the factories back home. We managed to correct the problems from qualifying today which was great and I pushed as hard as I could. For the overtake, I just stayed as close as possible to Nico and waited for the moment to be just close enough to throw it up the inside. This is a good circuit to be able to follow another car but it's still not easy. You have to judge the risk in these situations but I felt confident I could pull it off. Once I got past Nico, it was just about controlling the race. I'm very, very proud to now hold the record for the most Formula One wins for a British driver. I have to say, though, it's all thanks to the team and the car we have this year that I've been able to reach that landmark so quickly. Ten wins in a season is just… well, wow!

Nico Rosberg
It was a tough day for me and it feels horrible to finish second after starting from pole. The conditions were very different compared to yesterday and it took me too long to find my rhythm at the beginning. In Formula One it is all about adapting quickly, but it just took me too long. Only 10 laps after Lewis passed me, I got it right and was able to push much more. Lewis just did a better job today, so congratulations to him. It's getting tougher but there is still a chance for the title and everything can happen. I'm still going to be pushing flat out just as I always have. I never give up.

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