Max Verstappen inflicts F1 title blow on Lando Norris with US Grand Prix Sprint win

Max Verstappen started the United States Grand Prix Sprint race on pole with F1 title rival Lando Norris in fourth, though the McLaren man was still eyeing another victory

Lando Norris threw everything at Max Verstappen but missed the chance to further close the points gap to his title rival yesterday.

The first of three Sprint races across the final six rounds of the season provided the Brit with extra opportunities to pile further pressure on the defending champion. But the damage was done on Friday when Verstappen took pole for the Austin Sprint, while Norris only managed to go fourth fastest with a "shocking" lap.

The McLaren man rose a couple of places in the first of two races at the Circuit of the Americas this weekend, but didn't have the pace to challenge the upgraded Red Bull. Carlos Sainz even passed him on the final lap after getting the better of Ferrari team-mate Charles Leclerc, forcing Norris to settle for third.

And it was a Sprint to forget for Mercedes as George Russell slipped from second on the grid to fifth, ahead of Lewis Hamilton who struggled for pace despite claiming he should have secured pole the day before.

Norris has been lampooned for his sluggish starts at times this season, but he was not hanging around here. Furious to be starting fourth, he had flown up to second within just a few corners with a brilliant launch off the line to dive past Leclerc and Russell.

The latter was so intent on challenging pole-sitter Verstappen into the first corner that he was careless on the exit and suffered a snap of oversteer. It was all Norris needed to power through and set his sights on the back of his title rival's car.

But that was the only angle of the Red Bull he would see in the first half of this 19-lap Texas tussle. By the beginning of the fifth, Verstappen had pulled himself more than one second away from the McLaren to make sure Norris didn't have the benefit of DRS and that was the moment the Brit began to fall further back.

Other than Norris' early rise, the opening stages were dominated by a furious fight of Ferraris. Leclerc had started third but was in danger of falling to fifth with Sainz all over his gearbox, perhaps with a point to prove across his final six race weekends before he is replaced by Hamilton.

Leclerc showed excellent judgement to hold off the other red car several times but the Spaniard had an extra touch of pace and eventually muscled past. But despite the Ferrari infighting, Hamilton was not able to take advantage and had been dropped by both.

He and Russell were suffering from graining tyres and soon he had been swallowed up by the two Scuderia machines. And things looked like they were beginning to change at the front, too, with Norris closing the gap to Verstappen having managed his tyres in hope of being able to launch a late assault on the Dutchman.

But that was the cue for Verstappen to put his foot down and show that he too had been nursing his rubber. He gains just two points on Norris but, perhaps more crucially, denied the Brit one of his few remaining chances to close the gap in the title fight.

It would only have been a one-point difference had Sainz not slipped by the McLaren on the final lap. Leclerc might have done so too had he not bailed out of a late move which risked them both colliding and crashing out.

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