US Grand Prix 2012: live Lap 18 That's not only a huge blow for Webber but also for Red Bull as they still haven't clinched the constructor's championship. Right then, no title for Vettel or Red Bull as things stand. Massa told if he can keep going like he is he'll get on the podium...and not sure about that I don't see how he'll over take Hamilton and they certainly won't let him go ahead of Alonso. Lap 17 Alonso being told something in Italian and my limited knowledge twinned with the words DRS and Vettel suggests he is just having an update on the front two. Bad news for Webber in his Red Bull, KERS has failed and that's going to infuriate him. It's not the first time this season by any means and expect Alonso to take third soon, Oh he has! I think the failure is terminal, Webber's out of the race! Lap 16 Looks like we have our first retirement of the afternoon and it's the Toro Rosso of Jean Eric Vergne and I think it's down to steering failure. A safety car here will be ideal for Hamilton and a nightmare for Vettel. Yellow flag situation at the moment Lap 15 0.9 seconds now the gap between Hamilton and Vettel and the latter is rattled by this, I'll be honest I'm a little surprised by it! The Red Bull's dominated everything this weekend, what's going on! 296 kph is Vettel's top speed compared to Hamilton's which is 313kph Lap 14 Sauber the next team to bring a driver in and Kobayashi pits. McLaren tactics team now trying to figure out how to get Button past Senna and into the top 10. Hamilton told the "window or target pit" is open. I wouldn't imagine he will come in until around lap 22 Lap 13 Raikkonen finally gets the overtake, forcing Hulkenberg to take the inside line and just nipping past him on the left. Wonderful move from the Lotus driver. Welcome to the race Jenson Button, he's now making all the sector timers go purple and by quite a significant amount! Lap 12 Raikkonen and Hulkenberg battling and every turn they are taking the 5th spot from each other but goodness me this is great defensive driving from the Force India, well done, the young German showing just why he's off to a bigger team next season. Massa told he is "killing" his rivals with his speed and warned that he's about to enter the Hulk v Raik battle Mr Holgate, I agree: I like this track. Racing all over the place. Turn 1 is superb. Lap 11 Hamilton now just half a second away from being in a DRS zone to make a move on Vettel, brilliant car...then again it looked good in Abu Dhabi and we all know what happened there. Massa driving well also, he started in 11th afterc the gearbox change and he's up to 7th now having just made a move on Di Resta. 1-10 Vettel, Hamilton, Webber, Alonso, Hulkenberg, Raikkonen, Di Resta, Massa, Perez, Senna Lap 10 "Purple every sector, fastest man out there" HAmilton told and he really is flying he's taken half a second off Vettel's lap. Seems there is a problem with Grosjean's car as he's just pitted and will emerge at the back. Lap 9 problems now it seems for the Williams of Maldonado who has lost almost all the grip on his tyres, his team-mate Senna meanwhile just made a great move on Schumacher. I'm sitting here tutting and shaking my head at Mr Grosjean who has lost even more places and he's doing it on the same corner nearly every lap. Lap 8 Hamilton gaining ground on Vettel he's shaved three tenths off the gap in the last two laps. Hamilton told he is doing an "excellent job" and is the fastest driver on the track. Things looking better for Button who's warmed his car up now, he's just overtaken Grosjean. Lap 7 And turn 19 takes it's first victim, it's been talked about all weekend. Grosjean spins out and it's cost him a lot of places but he is still in the race. The Frenchman now is struggling has he possible damaged the car because his race speed is really slowing down. Lap 6 So much over taking going on I'm afraid I can barely keep up, these corners in Austin are so wide there's so much scope to nipping a cheeky position. Button's now taken the position from Maldonado, fifth time's a charm! Also a great duel going on further up between Hulkenberg and Grosjean, the former the victor for now. Lap 5 McLaren on the radio to Lewis Ahmilton: "Fantastic job Lewis, gap with Vettel down to 2.5 we can catch him." Meanwhile his team-mate is still struggling and he's chasing the Williams' down in 13th, tyres really struggling to warm up and oh dear, he's wheel-to-wheel with Maldonado...a sentence to make many drivers shudder! Lap 4 Replays show just how good Alonso was at the start, well done the Ferrari engineer that suggested the gearbox change. As I said at the start of the blog it would enable him to go into the first turn in 4th and he did. And now Hamilton has made the move on Webber again and this time takes it and is riding in 2nd, has he got enough to go faster than Vettel? Lap 3 DRS enabled and no we'll start to see even more overtaking. Vettel's lap time is 2.6 seconds faster than Alonso's, that's quite unbelievable. Hamilton's pace takes him past Webber but it's only for a matter of seconds as he went way wide on the turn and the Aussie reclaims the place. Probably would have been forced to yield anyway but this McLaren is flying! Lap 2 Schumacher loses a spot then with young German Hulkenberg taking 5th off his hands and that will prove to be a very important move for him. Hamilton finding very good pace and clearing himself from Alonso behind him in 4th. Grosjean miraculously has managed to get through the first lap without causing an incident but he comes SO CLOSE to contacting with Schumacher! Phew that was lucky!. Lap 1 Vettel gets a decent start and Webber goes wheel to wheel with Hamilton and he gets past and Alonso comes up and into 4th! Fantastic for Ferrari that move worked tremendously. Terrible first lap though for Jenson Button he is way back in 16th! 1-5 Vettel, Webber Hamilton, Alonso, Schumacher A final word from our man Tom Cary in Texas: Classic bit of 11th hour Formula One intrigue over in Austin. The whole paddock feverishly discussing the moral conundrum raised by Ferrari's decision to break the seal on Massa's gearbox. I was just next to Alexander Wurz in the Gents and he wasn't too sure about the ethics of it all. "Not really in the spirit of the regulations," he murmured before dashing off. Anyway, it's happened now and we have a hell of a start in prospect. What chance Alonso being taken out by his new neighbours on the grid? I have a feeling the title race will go on to Brazil. Either way, great atmosphere here. All cars on medium compound tyres except for Button and Rosberg (hard) How they start: 1st row Sebastian Vettel (GER/Red Bull) Lewis Hamilton (GBR/McLaren) 2nd row Mark Webber (AUS/Red Bull) Kimi Raikkonen (FIN/Lotus) 3rd row Michael Schumacher (GER/Mercedes) Nico Hulkenberg (GER/Force India) 4th row Fernando Alonso (ESP/Ferrari) Romain Grosjean (FRA/Lotus) 5th row Pastor Maldonado (VEN/Williams) Bruno Senna (BRA/Williams) 6th row Felipe Massa (BRA/Ferrari) Jenson Button (GBR/McLaren) 7th row Paul di Resta (GBR/Force India) Jean-Eric Vergne (FRA/Toro Rosso) 8th row Sergio Perez (MEX/Sauber) Kamui Kobayashi (JPN/Sauber) 9th row Nico Rosberg (GER/Mercedes) Daniel Ricciardo (AUS/Toro Rosso) 10th row Timo Glock (GER/Marussia) Charles Pic (FRA/Marussia) 11th row Vitaly Petrov (RUS/Caterham) Heikki Kovalainen (FIN/Caterham) 12th row Pedro de la Rosa (ESP/HRT) Narain Karthikeyan (IND/HRT) 18:56 as a footnote to the Vettel/Alonso race for the title, the German will become only the third driver to win three consecutive titles if he does it today. Right, race time and boy do i hope this race is as good as Abu Dhabi! 18:54 permutations and predictions then. If Vettel wins the race and Alonso is no higher than 5th, Vettel wins the title. He will also win the title if he finishes 2nd as long as Alonso does not better than 9th and 3rd place finish for the Red Bull driver will secure the championship but only if Alonso fails to score. I don't think Vettel's going to win the title today, I think that move by Ferrari will prove pivotal to keeping the race going all the way to Brazil next weekend. I'm going for Vettel Alonso and Raikkonen on the podium. Note to Hamilton, keep your eyes on the rear mirror, Grosjean's behind you! 18:48 And a word from Vettel from the grid: We start o the right side so that gives us a good chance. It's steep to turn one and it's wide then so we should be fine. Not much to feel about it it's their business. Even if it does [annoy me] what's the point in getting annoyed? 18:44 It's going to be a tough start this afternoon for anyone lower than 6th I think, and one man that's none too happy with where he is placed is Jenson Button. Here's what he had to say yesterday: It's a pity to start so far back because the car is fun to drive around here, and I love the first sector. Turns two to nine are fantastic. So now we'll see what it's like at turn one in the middle of the pack. It's going to be tricky. I was there a couple of races ago and it didn't end well for me - hopefully it won't be the same - so we'll see what we can do. It's going to be a long day because it's not that easy to overtake here," added Button. It doesn't mean we can't overtake as the pace of the car is pretty good. We're not as quick as Red Bull, but I don't think there's anybody else quicker than us other than them, so we can still have fun. Here's what the grid girls look like in Texas... Let me bring you a little more information about the track, here's the Circuit of The Americas in numbers: Venue: Circuit of The Americas, Austin, Texas •Circuit length: 5.516km/3.752miles •Laps: 56 •Race distance: 308.896km/191.165miles •Number of corners: 20 (11 left/9 right) •Tyre compounds to be used: hard/medium •Overtaking chance: Into turns 1, 11 and 12 •Estimated lap time: 1min 37secs •Gear changes per lap: 58 (race = 3248) Here's what our F1 man Tom Cary had to say on that via Twitter: If you do have to prove there's problem with gearbox to change it would alter nature of clever v cynical debate..fabricating problem would be cynical. raises plenty of talking points. Clever? Cynical? Both? Any different to Red Bull in Abu Dhabi starting SV from pit-lane and changing set-up? And do these sorts of shenanigans alienate would-be US fans, bearing in mind tyre fiasco at Indy in 2005? #f1 18:25 The only man that can deny Vettel his third consecutive title this year is Alonso and boy are Ferrari doing as much as they can to get him climbing the ranks after lights out. The Spanish driver had a poor qualifying session yesterday and was down to start the race in 8th but will now move to 7th because the team have "suddenly" had to replace Felipe Massa's gearbox which as we all know incurs a five grid penalty so he's dropping from 6th to 11th. The advantage is now that Alonso is not starting the race on the dirtier side of the track. To prevent Vettel winning, he must finish 4th or higher. The decision from Ferrari to go ahead with this gearbox change has really split opinions on Twitter, some saying it's fair game and a good decisions, others saying that while it's not breaking any rules it is not sporting. I think it's a great move by Ferrari, they have a title at stake and will do anything to win it though it's going to being them a lot of negative publicity...what do you think? Drop me an email and let me know. 18:18 Again I bring you records and stats surrounding our defending world champion who I don't think will clinch the title today...I am probably wrong and I suppose it's me hoping more than believing he wont wrap things up today as everyone loves a season that goes down the final race...don't we? Anyway the German driver is today racing his 100th GP. In his 99 races to date Vettel's record is not too shabby having been on pole 35 times and taken the chequered flag on 26 occasions, along with 19 other podium finishes 18:10 Today's race takes place at a £250million facility just outside Austin, Texas, in the Circuit of The Americas. It's the 19th and penultimate race of the season and the title is still up for grabs with Red Bull's Sebastian Vettel 10 points clear of Fernando Alonso in his Ferrari. If you missed qualifying or practice this week and are yet to see much of the new track then check out this flying lap and you'll see what the driver have to contend with. 18:00 Good afternoon/evening/middle of the night F1 fans and welcome to my penultimate live blog of the season! Last season the sport welcomed India to the calendar, today the F1 family opens its arms out to another new track, yes F1 is back in the States and let's hope that it's a case of 10th time's a charm for the sport which returns after a five year absence having struggled to charm the crowds over there. Riverside, Sebring, Watkins Glen, Dallas, Detroit, Las Vegas, Long Beach, Phoenix and Indianapolis have all played host at some stage over the past 60 years though with little success.