Grosjean: “The Austin circuit is a lot like Silverstone”

Of the 20 tracks represented in the calendar, the one in Austin is one of the drivers’ favorites. Romain Grosjean (Haas) appreciates the technicality of the track. 5,513 kilometers long, it offers a mix of turns straight out of legendary motorsport venues (Spa, Suzuka, Silverstone), as well as an impressive climb towards the first braking. “Sector 1 is my favorite part.”, he admits. “You have to brake first before the first blind corner. Once you're in the rhythm, just stick to the basics (braking, turning the wheel, aiming for the apex and accelerating) and there are no more surprises there.", summarizes the Frenchman.

The cars then snake around corners at high speed. “The Austin circuit is a lot like Silverstone, especially the Maggotts-Becketts-Chapel sequence. You must try to keep the pace as high as possible. Next comes the hairpin preceding the opposite straight. Braking at the end of the straight is very violent. Then, we negotiate a slower and tighter sector, marked by the hairpin. We then have to dive into a long right curve, which will go almost flat out in qualifying”, believes Romain Grosjean. The tour ends with “two medium speed left turns, quite interesting; in the first, the track goes down, while it goes up in the second.”

Despite the rapid nature of the route, overtaking is rarer than elsewhere. “It’s not that easy to overtake”, recognizes the bearer of the number 8. “DRS provides a boost on the opposite straight, and the track is extremely wide towards first braking. But on the other hand, it’s so difficult to follow a car in the first sector as well as in the long right turn…” In these places, the single-seaters risk being blown away by the drivers in front of them, and losing precious tenths.

It was on this Austin track that the Frenchman achieved the best performance of his career in the discipline, with a second place at the wheel of a Lotus behind Sebastien Hag (Red Bull), and ahead of Mark Webber (Red Bull) in 2013. “It was a wonderful day.”, he remembers. “ Of all the new circuits that I was able to discover in F1, it is undoubtedly one of the best. I had a good start from third place on the grid. We didn't think we would keep the advantage over Webber, but we had a very good car. »

Find an exclusive interview with Romain Grosjean, who analyzes the strengths and weaknesses of his Haas team in issue 2136 of AUTOhebdo, available now in digital version on all platforms and from Wednesday October 18 on newsstands.