Nico Hulkenberg thought about one stop in F1 Las Vegas GP but did away from it, while Kevin Magnussen got stuck due to the strategy.
Amid graining and high degradation, Haas thought of a bold strategy of one stop in F1 Las Vegas GP. Both Hulkenberg and Magnussen were lined-up to do so, but only the Dane did it after the German opted against it, while involved in the thick of things for points.
They both did stretch their first stint as others around them pitted early. While Hulkenberg didn’t lose a huge chunk, it wasn’t the same for Magnussen. The German managed to put on a late pass on Yuki Tsunoda in the fight for sixth in the constructors’ championship.
The four points allowed Haas to leap back to sixth and drop Alpine to seventh by one point, with Visa Cash App RB three behind. “You never know, every point matters, I am just happy that we maximised the opportunity, we had the pace but certainly it was tough and challenging race with tyres and graining,” said Hulkenberg to media after the race.
“I guess everyone in the midfield had the same difficulties, but I think we managed it well, off-set our strategy a bit, decided to delay the stop to have fresher tyre at the end and that worked well and paid off, so happy. We managed well during the graining period too, at that moment we thought about one stop and even after the first stop.
“We thought of it but I think after couple of laps on the hard, I realised that it is probably not going to happen,” summed up Hulkenberg, who made a decent start to the race when he briefly overtook Oscar Piastri, but the Australian came back on him to retake the position pretty soon.
“We were side-by-side in Turn 1 and overtook him in Turn 3-4-5,” he said. “The start was decent but after last year, everyone was more cautious, so it was a bit static, there were not really many gaps. He took me into Turn 14, outside 14, kind of step aside but fair racing, he gave the room and got him there.”
His teammate Magnussen was in a battle of his own at the start, as well. The first was against Liam Lawson – who he complained about on the radio – and then later in the grand prix, again against the Kiwi, which allowed Sergio Perez to take the inside line at Turn 14 to pass them both.
Magnussen was on the outside and Lawson in the middle. “That’s fine, that’s racing [against Lawson and Perez],” he reflected. “I wasn’t happy [with Lawson at the start], because he was moving and I was right behind him in the slipstream and he couldn’t decide which way to go and that’s not a good thing.”
The Dane was not happy with the strategy though, as the one stop didn’t help him at all and he lost all the positions he could have gained via two stop. “I think we were the only car on the one stop which doesn’t seem like the right thing but here we are,” said Magnussen. “I have to go and ask [about the thinking behind it]. It didn’t pay off absolutely and it seemed like a stretch.
“I was just nowhere on the medium and I kept going and going, and I lost all the positions to everybody, you are at a point of no return at that point. But yeah, not great. I realised that it was point of no return, everyone overtook me and undercut, you either pit and go behind everyone on the same strategy or something else, I think once we got there, it was game over,” summed up Magnussen.
Here’s Kevin Magnussen losing out to Sergio Perez: https://www.formula1.com/en/video/2024-las-vegas-grand-prix-perez-pulls-off-brilliant-double-overtake-to-take-two-cars-in-one-corner.1816587664485120540
Here’s how F1 Las Vegas GP panned out
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