Track limits chaos in Austin: more than 200 violations in Friday practice
Drivers at the Circuit of the Americas lost lap after lap to track limits on Friday. Ahead of qualifying, concern is growing about deleted times.
Symbolic image · Photo: mrlaugh (Flickr) / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0 (cropped and resized)
Track limits are becoming a major talking point at the United States Grand Prix. According to RacingNews365, 207 laps were deleted for track limits violations across the two Friday sessions. F1ingenerale counted 79 reports in FP1 and 129 in FP2, with Alexander Albon (21) and Lando Norris (18) the most frequent offenders. Turn 12 at the end of the long straight and the final corner, Turn 20, came up most often. Max Verstappen also lost his fastest FP1 lap at Turn 19.
Championship leader Kimi Antonelli puts it down mostly to the drivers. "The track limits [violations] mainly come from mistakes," the Mercedes driver told RacingNews365. He added that "the green bit on some of the exits is very grippy", tempting drivers to run wide, and said the FIA was trying to widen the white lines.
Saturday's qualifying could therefore become a lottery. "Track limits will be a key factor tomorrow in Qualifying, as we've seen lots of laps deleted today," Aston Martin ambassador Pedro de la Rosa told Formula1.com. George Russell said: "I lost one lap to track limits and then had a big moment in sector one on the next."