It’s very rare for the Formula 1 media centre to break out in applause at the result of a race, but such is the rarity of a Kimi Raikkonen victory nowadays, there was little surprise the assembled journalists (yours truly included) showed a sign of congratulations to the Ferrari man upon the chequered flag in Austin on Sunday. For the first time in over five-and-a-half years - and more than nine in Ferrari colours - Raikkonen was a race winner again. For all of the jokes about dud strategy calls from Ferrari and its tendency to favour Sebastian Vettel, this time around, the team did everything right, allowing Raikkonen to take a hugely popular victory in superb fashion. The result was a surprise in many ways, most of all for the fact there was no coronation party as anticipated for Lewis Hamilton. Needing only an eight-point swing over Vettel to clinch his fifth title with three races to spare and starting from pole position, it seemed highly likely that matters would be settled in Austin. When Vettel spun around during his wheel-to-wheel fight with Daniel Ricciardo on the opening lap of the race, even with Hamilton running P2 behind Raikkonen, the odds were stacked heavily in his favour. But Mercedes’ push to win the race with Hamilton prompted a strategy call that ultimately backfired, forcing the champagne bottles to be put on ice ahead of their likely uncorking in Mexico next Sunday. Mercedes may have felt qualifying on the Supersofts would help in terms of strategy, making it an easy one-stop for Hamilton, but it actually contributed to his decline in the end.This was most evident at the start when, fitted with the faster Ultrasoft compound, Raikkonen was able to get a better start and dive up the inside of Hamilton at Turn 1 before pulling out a decent buffer through the first stint. The Virtual Safety Car called on Lap 10 following Daniel Ricciardo’s on-track stoppage forced the pit walls into action. The benefit of pitting under VSC is clear, for with the rest of the field at a reduced speed, the time lost in the pits is around nine seconds instead of 19. For Raikkonen in particular, it seemed like a great opportunity to get rid of the Ultrasofts and minimise the time lost to Hamilton. Hamilton was told over team radio to do the opposite to Raikkonen at the end of Lap 11, with the Mercedes pit crew preparing for a possible stop. Ferrari’s mechanics remained seated in the garage, prompting Hamilton to pit, take on a set of Softs and emerge from the pits in P3. The gap to Raikkonen stood at just eight seconds, meaning Hamilton theoretically had 11 seconds in hand. It seemed to be a massive own goal from Ferrari, particularly as Hamilton was able to take advantage of Raikkonen’s fading tyres and dipping lap times to close up in the space of seven laps, having been waved past teammate Valtteri Bottas. The feeling was that a one-stop strategy was still possible even after such an early stop, meaning that while Hamilton would have older tyres, he’d also enjoy a near-20-second buffer over Raikkonen once the Finn stopped. Yet Mercedes did not see it that way. Team boss Toto Wolff explained after the race that the moment Hamilton came in under the VSC, the plan was always to two-stop: “We were running second on the road and thought that by moving to a two-stop at that stage, we would only lose a position to Valtteri, catch up Kimi and then effectively be on the same one more stop to do but on a better tyre. That was the thinking. “We committed to a two-stop at that stage, also because our car wasn’t great and the tyres were degrading, so it all went against us.” The alarm bells had begun to ring for Mercedes, yet the strategy was still playing out much as Wolff had hoped. Hamilton had caught Raikkonen quickly, with both drivers still to do one further stop, and he would have fresher tyres later in the race. Both victory and the title were on in Austin. Raikkonen had other ideas though. Far from being the non-plussed, unmotivated racer he is unfairly made out to be at points, Raikkonen dug deep in his defence of P1 from Hamilton. Ferrari’s straight-line speed remains a cut above Mercedes’, as seen in how Raikkonen was able to pull clear on the back straight. If Hamilton was going to get into the lead, he’d have to work for it. Work for it Hamilton did, cooking his tyres in the process. With his job done, Raikkonen pitted from the lead at the end of Lap 21, knowing he had gone long enough to get to the end of the race on a single set of Softs. Hamilton was released, with the buffer to Raikkonen growing to over 17 seconds. It was in this phase of the race Hamilton’s tyres started to show signs of blistering as they neared the cliff, his times dropping off dramatically soon after. His laps went from mid-1m39s from Laps 25-30 to 1m41s in laps 33-37, causing the gap to Raikkonen to go from a stable 17 seconds to less than eight in the same period. “The thinking was that if we were to bite the bullet a little bit more, we would have a larger tyre differential at the end,” Wolff explained. “But then we started to drop massive pace and probably we were a lap or two late in pitting Lewis because the tyres dropped off in the mid-38s, low-39s to 41s.” That lap or two proved decisive in the race. It wasn’t even as though Mercedes was holding on so that Hamilton could run with Supersofts or Ultrasofts for the final stint, as he had no fresh sets remaining, meaning all he could use was another set of Softs. With a little hindsight, it’s easy to say an earlier stop would have been wise before the massive drop-off happened.<doc-sep>ESPN rounds up the main talking points from an entertaining U.S. Grand Prix, where Kimi Raikkonen claimed his first Formula One win since 2013 ahead of Max Verstappen meaning Lewis Hamilton will have to wait until next week's Mexican Grand Prix to win his fifth world title. Shock: When Sebastian Vettel spun out of contention (see below), I had no doubts in my mind Lewis Hamilton would be leaving Austin with the title. The fact he didn't is a testimony to how good the race that followed was, especially the performances of the two men who eat him to victory in Austin. As for his main championship rival.... Shocker: We might re-name this the Sebastian Vettel Award in 2019. It's remarkable how many errors he's made this year and his clash with Daniel Ricciardo dropped him down the order in a race where there was an opportunity to get in the mix and fight the Mercedes drivers. Somehow, Vettel always comes off worse when he clashes with other drivers and it's a part of his racecraft he's going to have to work on if he wants to win a fifth world championship next year. Raikkonen back on top: It's been five long years since Raikkonen's last win at the 2013 Australian Grand Prix. It's hard to remember as popular a win as this. The Finn made a great start, diving down the inside of Hamilton at Turn 1, and then executed two beautiful stints to convert into victory. With a move to Sauber coming, he didn't have many good chances left.... Raikkonen, Verstappen and Hamilton pose on the podium following the U.S. Grand Prix. Mark Thompson/Getty Images A megastar-in-waiting: The build-up to the weekend was all about how Hamilton was on the cusp of winning a fifth championship. He was denied that -- for this week, at least -- by a stunning performance by Max Verstappen late on. The Dutchman is in the form of his life right now and his defensive and clean defence on Hamilton late on was absolutely thrilling. Just imagine what Verstappen is going to be able to do when he gets a front-running car. Knock-out blow by Renault? : This was a huge race in terms of the midfield fight for fourth position. Romain Grosjean was eliminated early in the race and that helped Renault drivers Nico Hulkenberg and Carlos Sainz to a sixth and seventh -- Kevin Magnussen, in the other Haas, scored just two points in ninth. Alonso sees red: Fernando Alonso doesn't seem like a man who is going to miss Formula One very much. After being punted out of the race by Williams' Lance Stroll, the Spaniard said: "These guys are impossible to race with, just crashing into corners". Only three more to go... Driver of the day: Raikkonen had a great drive, but this has to be Verstappen. He started 18th on the grid and his driving in the latter stages, under huge pressure from Hamilton, was sublime.<doc-sep>AUSTIN, Texas -- The champagne will be back on ice in the run-up to the Mexican Grand Prix next Sunday, but in the meantime, Lewis Hamilton will be keeping one eye on his emails. After taking pole position in Austin on Saturday, he had the opportunity to clinch the title on Sunday, yet something went missing and, despite appearances, it wasn't down to race strategy. The job for the team now is to understand what went wrong. It would be easy for Mercedes to accept the result of Sunday's race and move on to Mexico safe in the knowledge that Hamilton only needs five points to secure the title, but that's not the team's style. What's more, the race for the constructors' title is not quite as one-sided as Hamilton's battle with Sebastian Vettel in the drivers' standings, and it's the constructors' that has staff bonuses attached to it. Once some answers are found, race engineer Pete Bonnington will send an email to Hamilton with some key pointers as to where the pace leaked away on Sunday. That email will then form the agenda for Thursday's engineering briefing in Mexico City, where a plan will be hatched to ensure a result like Sunday's doesn't happen again. "We just had a debrief," Hamilton said on Sunday evening, "and there a lot of things we could have done better today. There were certain things that weren't optimum for us which made it look even worse than it was. "There were a lot of things that were against us today and I have only just discovered certain things which make a lot of sense. Naturally being on the back foot you can blame strategy and a lot of different things, but we just weren't quick enough today. "Collectively we have lost some performance in some areas, but I think we know where it is and we still have three races to go." Hamilton was unable to overtake Raikkonen in the first portion of the race after the Virtual Safety Car period. Mark Thompson/Getty Images Pinpointing exactly where Mercedes went wrong on Sunday is not easy. As ever in F1, swings in performances are rarely down to one single reason but instead a combination of factors that either result in an upwards or downwards spiral in performance. In Mercedes' case, the car was clearly quick over a single lap in cooler conditions on Saturday but was in real trouble when it came to preserving the performance of a set of tyres over a race stint. So what changed? First off there was the ambient temperature, which went up by 10C when the sun finally came out on Sunday. That was a significant swing and resulted in Pirelli choosing to up its minimum tyre pressures on Sunday morning by 1.5 PSI to protect the integrity of the tyre. That's all well and good, but when the car setup is already set from qualifying due to parc ferme rules it means accommodating those two changes is not that easy. "It was definitely a different feeling with the car today on the higher pressures compared to the long runs we did in final practice," Bottas said. "In theory, it should have been the same for everyone, but I think the pressures set by Pirelli are almost 5 psi from optimum pressure -- way too high. But it's still the same for everyone." Higher ambient temperatures and higher minimum pressures at a track with high-load corners like Austin can have a big impact on tyre performance. Both factors make the tyre prone to overheating and blistering, especially if the bulk of the rubber on the tyre is not reduced by wear. It was no coincidence, therefore, that the hardest of the three compounds on offer this weekend (the yellow-striped soft tyre) had a tendency to overheat and blister. Because it didn't wear at the same rate as the super-soft and ultra-soft it retained more heat and that resulted in the blisters emerging on Hamilton's tyres in the second stint. Ferrari fared better on its tyres relative to Mercedes during the U.S. Grand Prix at COTA. Charles Coates/Getty Images What's more, the Mercedes was running more wing than the Ferraris and Red Bulls and therefore carrying more speed through the high-speed corners where even higher loads were transferred through the tyres. All small factors, but combine them with pushing hard while running in the dirty air of Raikkonen's Ferrari and they help to explain why the soft tyre, which should have been the most durable of the three compounds, was so badly blistered on Hamilton's second stint. "It was unexpected," Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff said. "We knew that this could be a problem but we were going strong in the first stint actually on the super-soft behind Kimi. It was good. "Then pitting for the softs on at that time it was still under control, but then Lewis started to push and the tyres started to blister. This is the moment we realised things were going against us." Of course, Mercedes wasn't alone in dealing with the hotter temperatures and higher tyre pressures on Sunday. All teams faced the same conditions and had to adjust their cars and their strategies accordingly. So those factors are hardly an excuse for Mercedes, more just an explanation of why a car that was so quick on Saturday struggled so much on Sunday. On top of the tyre issues, Mercedes also had a difficult build-up to the race. In the hours leading up to the start, both cars had to be stripped back to basics due to problems with their water pumps. Although the cars ran reliably in the race, Hamilton hinted that there was a knock-on effect on performance. "You saw the car was in a million pieces this morning, so that wasn't ideal for the race," he said. "Probably if we hadn't had a morning like that the race would have been a lot better. "We lost some pace and I have asked the engineers to go and dig deep and find out why.<doc-sep>AUSTIN, Texas -- Daniel Ricciardo punched a hole through the wall of his changing room after retiring from the U.S. Grand Prix. Ricciardo's race last just eight laps until he pulled over at the side of Turn 11 with a terminal car problem. The Australian had been running in fourth position -- compounding his misery further was the fact teammate Max Verstappen, who started 18th, finished the race in second. It continued Ricciardo's tough spell and means he has still not been back on the podium since winning May's Monaco Grand Prix. Horner said Ricciardo's frustration got the better of him after the race. "It's a crying shame for Daniel, I feel so sorry for him," Horner said. "It looks identical to the power unit issue he had in Bahrain where it's just gone into complete shutdown -- you could see it mid-corner. "He was driving a strong grand prix and would have been right there too. It's so frustrating for him. He's taken out his frustration in his room by putting his fist through the wall which you can totally relate to." Daniel Ricciardo was running in fourth position before his Renault engine failure. Mark Thompson/Getty Images While Horner said the Energy Store failure should not force Red Bull into a penalty at the Mexican Grand Prix, he admitted it was little consolation. "It turned out to be exactly the same failure as in Bahrain earlier in the year where it loks like a major issue in the Energy Store. It just takes out all the power. We've got another Energy Store within the allocation without having to take a penalty. The Renault guys in the garage apologised, which we appreciate, but the frustration is for Daniel."<doc-sep>
INCREDIBLE racing in the USA produced one of the most thrilling races of the season with Ferrari favourite Kimi Raikkonen living up to expectations when he refused to change his customary laconic style after claiming his first win wince 2013. INCREDIBLE racing in the USA produced one of the most thrilling races of the season with Ferrari favourite Kimi Raikkonen living up to expectations when he refused to change his customary laconic style after claiming his first win wince 2013. Raikkonen enjoyed his first F1 win in 113 races and his first since returning to Ferrari from Lotus four years ago, while Red Bull’s Max Verstappen came from 18th on the grid to finish second. Hamilton had to make do with another podium finish at the Circuit of Americas in Texas, one place ahead of title challenger Sebastian Vettel of Ferrari. “Thank you, f****** finally!" Raikkonen said as he crossed the line. But the 39-year-old Finn could not resist an ultra-dry riposte at the expense of Lewis Hamilton in the post race presser. Raikkonen was out to upset Hamilton's party Sitting in the green pre-podium room after the race, he leaned across to speak to the Briton, who was frustrated in his bid to clinch a fifth title and finished third. “So, did you win the championship today?” asked the Ferrari man, who will be leaving for Sauber next year. The delivery was so deadpan that the Mercedes driver was caught off-guard and muttered only a brief response. It was a classic addition to Raikkonen’s collected quotations, a list that included his radio response to a Renault engineer: “Leave me alone, I know what I am doing.” Raikkonen and Hamilton may both have been unaware of it, but Sunday’s race came exactly 11 years after the Finn’s victory and drivers’ title triumph for Ferrari in Brazil in Hamilton’s 2007 debut season. Assessing his race, Raikkonen added: "I got a good start and I needed to push hard, in the end the tyres were not in the best shape but it was the same for Max. "I just tried to keep the tyres alive. It's been a long time. I'm much happier than finishing second. I am happy. NOT AGAIN: RICCIARDO'S RACE ENDED EARLY "It was a balancing act but we did it well. It was a good battle and that's what we all want." Asked if he feared he wouldn't steal another win before his time with Ferrari ends (at the end of this season) Raikkonen responded with a typical nonchalant tone. "It's not like I never won a race of a title," he said. "I never made a thing out of it (the record). "This wouldn't have changed my life to win one more with Ferrari or not. It's nice for sure. "We always come to the race trying to do our best and fight for the win. Today we had a good day, I felt confident and this is how it worked out. Hamilton started from pole but the race began well for Ferrari with Raikkonen on ultra-soft tyres getting past the Briton at the start. However, Vettel spun off before lap two after he had overtaken Ricciardo before their cars touched while trying to defend a counter attack, an incident which shoved the German back to 15th. Happy times, Kimi back in the winning spot on the podium Hamilton took the lead when Raikkonen pitted for new tyres on lap 21. With blistering tyres, Hamilton was in the pits again on lap 37, but probably a shade too late, to emerge fourth, teammate Bottas then soon making way for him. The race and the title was fully in the balance as it went into a tense last 10 laps, with Raikkonen, Verstappen and Hamilton close together, and Vettel moving up on Bottas. The top three remained unchanged but Vettel was successful in overtaking Bottas. Raikkonen winning his 21st grand prix victory, ending a winless run of 113 races. The result means the gap between Hamilton and Vettel in the race for the title is 70 points. As such, the German driver must win the remaining four races to have a chances of claiming the title. Despite not winning the title in Austin, Hamilton was thrilled with the weekend. It was epic, I really enjoyed the race," he said. "It wasn't where I wanted to finish but the battle was awesome. It's what I dream of, it's what people watching TV want to see.