AUSTIN (Dispatches) - Red Bull’s Max Verstappen doubled his lead in the Formula One world championship to 12 points after holding off charging title rival Lewis Hamilton to win the U.S. Grand Prix in Austin on Sunday.
Mercedes’ seven-times world champion Hamilton slashed the Dutch driver’s lead with a late attack on fresher tires but finished 1.333 seconds behind, with a bonus point for fastest lap at the Circuit of the Americas.
Red Bull’s Mexican Sergio Perez was a distant third, struggling with dehydration after a water bottle failure in the Texas heat.
The win was Verstappen’s eighth of the season, and first in America, but one he had to sweat for in front of a sell-out 140,000 crowd.
The 24-year-old started out on pole position, ending a Mercedes run of qualifying domination in Texas, lost the lead into the first corner and then won it back with an aggressive pitstop strategy.
Hamilton was quickest when the lights went out, squeezing through on the inside at turn one with Verstappen forced to run wide and plenty of overtaking going on in their wake.
The pair pulled away from the field, with Perez unable to stay with them.
Verstappen soon started chafing over the radio that he had more pace and was first to pit on lap 11, as Red Bull went for the ‘undercut’ — a strategic bid to close the gap and get back in front when Hamilton pitted three laps later.