United States GP

Stars, stripes and speedStars, stripes and speed

2026 SEASON

See the Science at the Circuit of the Americas

We embark on the final quarter of the season with our second trip of the year to the US; to Austin, Texas and the mighty Circuit of the Americas, home of the United States Grand Prix.

Fittingly, for one of the oldest and most venerable races on the F1 calendar, COTA is a real racers' track: fast changes of direction; wheel-to-wheel racing; overtaking opportunities.

Session Times

FP1

FP2

FP3

Quali

Race

Toggle below to highlight parts of the track.

Sectors
Turns
DRS

Sector One is one of the greatest things in racing. You go up a huge hill to start the lap, and you drop straight back down like a rollercoaster.

Jak Crawford – Third Driver

Circuit length (km)
5.513
Number of corners
20
Race distance (km)
308.405

NEED TO KNOW: UNITED STATES GP

The essential Austin travel guide with Regent Seven Seas Cruises

Mastering the Circuit of the Americas

The magic of racing at the Circuit of the Americas

Ultimate United States Grand Prix facts

The essential Austin travel guide with Regent Seven Seas Cruises

F1 loves Austin. It took couple of seasons for the sport and the city to get to know one another, but for the last decade it's been an event to circle in the calendar. It's late in the season, people are tired – but going to race at the Circuit of the Americas puts a smile on everyone's face.

Some of that is down to the track: it produces good races and it's an easy place to work – but a lot of it is down to the city. The unofficial motto of the Texan capital is 'Keep Austin Weird', and F1 has been incorporated into that. There are events downtown all week and a real buzz around the place.

…not that you need F1 around to have a party in Austin. The city has a thriving live music culture and every night of the week you have a choice from dozens of venues – many of which line 6th Street – offering everything from Bluegrass to Scandinavian-inspired Death Metal. That said, for a hard-working F1 garagiste, music in Austin tends to come a distant second to dinner. This is a city that's built around barbecue, and has some of the world's best smokehouses. It's not quite sawdust on the floor but the vibe is definitely trestle tables, queues out the door, eat quickly and make space for somebody else.

We're heading to Austin a week or two earlier than usual, which is a shame for the members of the paddock who like to goggle at the Halloween displays out in the suburbs, but the city itself offers the genuinely spooky sight of the world's largest urban bat colony. The (Texan) Colorado River bisects the city and under the Congress Avenue Bridge, on Lady Bird Lake, there lurks a colony of 1.5 million Mexican free-tailed bats. Spectators gather at dusk to watch them fly… but the best way to see them is on the water, taking-in the fabled 'bat cruise'.

Mastering the Circuit of the Americas

The Circuit of the Americas is an interesting case study in that it's the rare example of a permanent racing circuit built specifically to cater for the demands of Formula One. Granted, plenty of other series race here, but the track was built to bring F1 back to the US, and it's done so to great impact, producing a race that is never, ever dull.

The track borrows some of F1's greatest hits, with an opening sector reminiscent of the high-speed, fast-change-of-direction Maggotts-Becketts-Chapel section from Silverstone, and the lap ends with a series of long loops that bear more than a passing resemblance to Hockenheim's Stadium Section. There might be a bit of Magny-Cours thrown in for good measure at the bottom of the circuit – but Turn One, the standout corner on the track, is pure, made-in-Texas, genius.

Downforce levels at COTA tend to be high but not too high. The straights are long enough that drivers like to keep straight-line speeds up to attack and defend. That has a marginally negative impact on Qualifying lap-time, but this tends to be a grand prix in which drivers have to look after their tyres, and not one where they're straining in the race for ultimate lap-time – thus the performance from a maximum downforce setup would likely go to waste, and instead everyone keeps it on the twitchy side of stable.

The magic of racing at the Circuit of the Americas

This is one of the big ones. While the other grands prix in the US tend to be about the glitz and glamour, COTA is all about the racing, which is why it draws the big crowds. COTA uses its contours well, with plenty of grandstands looking down onto the track. The loops of the final sector make each set of seats here an isthmus in the middle of the action, and there's always plenty of action to go around between T12-T20 – but the grandstands above Turn One have one of the best views in F1.

TV doesn't do Turn One justice: the rise from the grid up to the corner rivals Raidillon at Spa-Francorchamps in its gradient, but the clever thing is not the altitude but the exit: the corner is setup such that both the inside and outside lines are viable. It sees staunch defence, plenty of overtaking and more than its fair share of broken carbon fibre. The grandstand here has an excellent view of this – but looks out over other sections of track also.

The track does a good general admission ticket too, and it's worth having a wander around because there's plenty to see, with no shortage of merchandising venues and displays. There's also the COTA viewing platform for those with no fear of heights.

COTA also offers live music. In the past, the main stage on the back straight has hosted everyone on a race weekend from Taylor Swift to Elton John, by way of Queen, Green Day and, in 2024, Sting. Austin bills itself as the live music capital of the world – but you don't have to go downtown to see a show.

Ultimate United States Grand Prix facts

1 | Lance finished in seventh place at the 2023 United States Grand Prix after starting from the pitlane. The 13 positions he gained in that race were more than he had ever gained at any previous race in his career, only to improve it on his next US appearance when he rose 14 places from 19th on the grid to finish fifth in Las Vegas.

2 | Although Fernando is yet to win a Grand Prix in the United States, he took victory in the 2019 24 Hours of Daytona, and competed in the Indianapolis 500 in both 2017 and 2020.

3 | Fernando has more appearances at the United States Grand Prix than any other driver. This will be his 19th start.

4 | Fernando was on the podium at the inaugural Grand Prix at Circuit of the Americas when he finished third in 2012.

5 | Austin is one of 12 different venues to host a world championship F1 race in the United States, more than any other nation in the world,

6 | This is the 47th World Championship United States Grand Prix. The race made its debut in 1959. It had a first hiatus between 1981-1988, a second between 1992-1999, a third between 2008-2011, and a fourth due to the global pandemic in 2020.

7 | Austin is one of 12 different venues to host a World Championship F1 race in the United States, more than any other nation in the world.

8 | The race has been held at six different circuits. Sebring in Florida held the inaugural 1959 race, followed by Riverside circuit in California the following year. It then had a residency in upstate New York at Watkins Glen until 1980. Three races were held on a street circuit in Phoenix in the late 1980s, followed by a stint on a bespoke road course at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, before the race found its current home at the Circuit of the Americas.

9 | The US has also hosted a string of other World Championship rounds: the United States Grand Prix West at Long Beach ran from 1976 to 1983. It overlapped with the Detroit Grand Prix which operated from 1982-1988, and the Caesars Palace Grand Prix of 1981-2. There was a Dallas Grand Prix in 1984, the Miami Grand Prix since 2022, and the Las Vegas Grand Prix since 2023. Also, while never a Formula One race, the Indy 500 was an official round of the F1 World Championship between 1950-1960.

10 | COTA is a rare track that provides lap-time comparison between the world's top racing series. The ultimate lap record does, of course, belong to F1 at 1m36.169s. The now-defunct LMP1 came in next at 1m47.052s, just ahead of IndyCar at 1m48.8953s. MotoGP is at 2m02.221s, Superbikes at 2m07.497s and NASCAR at 2m11.549s.