How Raikkonen finally ended his win drought

"Finally," said Kimi Raikkonen after ending a run of 111 starts without a victory by winning the United States Grand Prix. He prefaced that word with a much stronger one, revealing frustration over his long drought that matched the feelings of those underwhelmed by his inability in recent years to string together race-winning performances when he had the pace and opportunity to do so.

But at Austin, Raikkonen drove faultlessly and unexpectedly stole the thunder of Lewis Hamilton, whose coronation as a five-time champion was delayed for at least one more week. Raikkonen held a decent, but not dominant, hand at the start of the race that he had to play to perfection in the critical moments to come out on top. This was a race many drivers might have won and not only Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton, who flashed across the line in the Ferrari's wake.

But this is Raikkonen, a driver with a habit of falling short in at least one critical moment on a race weekend. To win this race, he needed to roll back the years and nail it in every moment - not just most of them.

The first critical point was out of Raikkonen's hands, namely Ferrari's decision to split its starting tyre strategy by sending the Finn out on ultrasofts in Q2 while the rest of the frontunners used supersofts. This locked him in to starting on the softest tyre compound, which while not the ideal one for the race - start on supersofts then finish on softs was the preferred strategy - it offered the tantalising opportunity of using the new-tyre bite to lead at the start.

This led to the next critical moment - the start. Thanks to Sebastian Vettel's three-place grid penalty for speeding under the red flag on Friday, Raikkonen started second and with the inside line. With that extra grip there was every chance of him jumping polesitter Hamilton. But this is Raikkonen, a driver who had not finished the opening lap having improved on his starting position for an astonishing 37 races.

He nailed it. The grip was there, and he had a small but decisive advantage over Hamilton on the run up the hill that the Mercedes driver could do nothing about. Raikkonen had the inside line to himself, and emerged from the first corner in clear air.

Another incident played in Raikkonen's favour on the first lap, with Vettel's vanishingly slender title hopes taking another hit when he spun after contact with Red Bull driver Daniel Ricciardo. This latest Vettel mishap occurred while he was trying to hold on to the fourth place he had taken from Ricciardo earlier in the lap.

After running wide out of Turn 12, he went into the Turn 13 right hander with Ricciardo just ahead and on the outside, with a rear-end wobble as he tried to hold an inside line sending him into the Red Bull.

"We thought that by committing to a two stop at that stage, we would only lose position to Valtteri" Toto Wolff explains Mercedes' strategy

"Initially, he had a better exit out of Turn 12 but then he came back," said Vettel. "I think he didn't see me so then we went side-by-side. He tried to go around the outside and we touched pretty much wheels on. After the touch, I spun."

Ricciardo did leave Vettel space, but it's always high risk to be on the outside, making this a textbook racing incident - not the first one the Ferrari driver has been involved in. This effectively put Vettel out of contention in a race he was confident he had the pace to win, and crucially let Raikkonen have a clear run at victory without any risk of having to play the team game in a vainglorious attempt boost his team-mate's title hopes.

During the next phase of the race, there were two critical requirements. The Ferrari pitwall tasked Raikkonen with establishing a 2.5s lead over Hamilton, but more importantly he had to ensure that he didn't overdo it on his ultrasofts. Go too hard and he might be forced into an earlier stop, which raised the fear of having to switch to a two-stop strategy on a weekend where valuable data had been lost on Friday thanks to the wet conditions.

On the first objective, Raikkonen succeeded to a point. On the seventh lap, he did get the lead to a fraction over 2.6s, although Hamilton reeled him back in and got the gap back down to 1.5s by the time the virtual safety car was deployed just as the leaders completed the 10th lap. This was thanks to the elimination of one of the drivers who could have been in victory contention in the closing stages: Ricciardo.

He was running fourth in the Turn 11 hairpin when his Renault engine suddenly shut down due to a battery problem. He immediately pulled to the left, and his visible frustration on getting out the car grew to the point that he punched a hole in the wall of his driver's room when back in the paddock.

This was the next critical moment: to stop, or not to stop under the VSC? Mercedes ordered Hamilton to do the opposite to Raikkonen, and when the Ferrari jinked to the left on the run to the last corner as if he was heading to the pits, it seemed that would be to stay out. But it was a feint, and as Raikkonen headed into the final corner the chasing Mercedes dived into the pits to take on soft Pirellis at the end of lap 11.

"We were running second on the road and thought that by committing to a two stop at that stage, we would only lose position to Valtteri," said Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff. "We would catch up Kimi and be on the same [strategy], with effectively one more stop to do, and on a better tyre."

It was a risky move, for while what Wolff said is correct it also guaranteed there would be a phase of the race when Raikkonen was the one on fresher rubber having pitted to take on softs and could close the gap. Given the Finn was already effectively on an alternative strategy thanks to starting on the ultras, it was a gamble to set Hamilton on that path.

Perhaps the expectation was that Raikkonen would stop given the relatively short range of his ultrasofts and that Hamilton was far more likely to stay out as a result. But the strategy wasn't really the problem - that was yet to become apparent with the blistering of the rears on the softs that subsequently made Hamilton's life difficult. This in itself was a consequence of the lack of set-up time thanks to Friday's rain-hit practice. It set up a fascinating race.

"I needed to keep the gap - aiming for certain lap times and looking after the tyres" Kimi Raikkonen

While the Mercedes was out of sight, he wasn't out of mind for Raikkonen. Hamilton emerged from the pits with a gap that settled at around 9.5s to the leader. Team-mate Bottas was between the pair, but over 5s behind Raikkonen and no threat, and was duly ordered to let Hamilton past on the run to Turn 1 on lap 14. By the end of the backstraight on lap 18, Hamilton was within a second of Raikkonen and eager to get past.

This was the next critical moment for Raikkonen, who had been as much as two seconds a lap slower than Hamilton during this period on his ageing ultrasofts. Keeping Hamilton behind would accelerate the thermal degradation of his rival's tyres, and stop him using his pace to build up a bigger lead.

Hamilton came close to passing, but Raikkonen stood firm all the way to the end of lap 21. It was a brief, but crucial, stand from a driver who even in the bad times has proved adept at holding position when in a slower car.

"We had a pretty good battle," said Raikkonen. "I tried to stay as far [on those tyres] as I could. I could hold him back. Then once we did the pitstops, I needed to keep the gap. I caught up a little bit and kept the gap aiming for certain lap times and looking after the tyres."

Raikkonen re-emerged in fifth place, just under 20s behind leader Hamilton. This was another key phase of the race, as he needed to ensure he kept his car firmly inside the pit window that meant he would get back ahead when Hamilton stopped. The radio communication with Hamilton indicated the figure Mercedes had in mind was 19.5s, and with fresh rubber Raikkonen soon hauled himself from the edge of that window to 2.5s inside it.

Raikkonen was then instructed to match Hamilton's lap times to avoid taking too much out of his tyres, which he did until lap 31 when the gap first dipped under 17s. Hamilton's tyres, approaching 20 laps old, were suffering from rear blisters that accelerated the degradation, meaning he was struggling for pace. But while Raikkonen was closing the gap there was a far bigger problem developing in the form of Max Verstappen.

The Red Bull driver started 18th thanks to a failure in Q1 when he struck a kerb at the exit of Turn 15 and the lower wishbone failed on the right-rear corner. As a result, the driveshaft was yanked out of the gearbox, forcing that to be changed as a precaution and resulting in a further grid drop.

But just as at Sochi, Verstappen made short work of passing the 'Class B' cars, which as usual had no interest in squandering time battling with a car they had no hope of beating. Verstappen climbed to fifth on lap seven by passing Nico Hulkenberg, by which time he was within 17 seconds of leader Hamilton.

Verstappen made his one pitstop to switch from softs to supersofts on lap 22, undercutting his way past Bottas for what was effectively third place. At 23s down, he was out of the pitstop window of Hamilton when he emerged, but when Hamilton's pace faded he began to close.

On lap 33, Verstappen moved into Hamilton's pitstop window, meaning the Mercedes driver now had two cars to pass in his final stint if he wanted to win. In the end, Hamilton went all the way to the end of lap 37 before stopping, by which time Raikkonen was only eight seconds behind. He had surely run too long?

"The thinking was that if we were to bite the bullet a little bit more [and extend the stint], we would have a larger tyre differential at the end," said Wolff. "But then we started to drop massive pace and probably we were a lap or two late in pitting Lewis because the tyres really dropped off from [lap times of] mid-38s, low 39s to 41s."

"It was a great day to prove some people wrong and have a good race, but it doesn't really change anything for me. Life goes on" Kimi Raikkonen

When Hamilton emerged from his stop, he was in fourth place and 13s behind Raikkonen, who had Verstappen chasing him. The odd man out was Bottas, who was inevitably told to let Hamilton past to facilitate his team-mate's charge.

From lap 39 to 47, Hamilton was the fastest man on track and closing on Verstappen by an average of 0.9s per lap. He was around a second faster than Raikkonen, meaning the top three concertinaed together. At the end of lap 48, Raikkonen led from Verstappen by 1.320s and Hamilton by 2.567s.

This was Raikkonen's final, and most important, test. Could he keep Verstappen at bay? The answer was yes, he could. The Red Bull got close, which actually helped to protect Raikkonen from Hamilton by giving Verstappen the benefit of the DRS. During a tense final nine laps, the trio inched ever-closer, but nobody was able to attempt a move - until lap 54.

Hamilton got close to Verstappen into Turn 12 with the help of the DRS. Verstappen ran a little deep, allowing Hamilton to attack around the outside into the Turn 13 right-hander. He couldn't make it the long way round, but cut back to the inside. Again, no way through, but he forced Verstappen to defend into the Turn 15 left hander and was able to attack on the run to the long Turns 16-18.

Again, he tried to make the outside line work and he briefly nosed ahead, but Verstappen had the inside and Hamilton ran wide off the track at the exit. Game over. Had Hamilton passed Verstappen, he would briefly have been in position to seal the championship, but the recovering Vettel passing Bottas, who was struggling badly with his soft tyres, on the run to Turn 12 on the penultimate lap would have denied Hamilton, who indicated after the race that his car was lacking a few tenths of pace to minor floor damage and another mystery problem, whatever happened.

All of this gave Raikkonen enough breathing space to enjoy the final two laps to the chequered flag. More than five years on, he was a winner again. He'd passed every test, delivered in every crunch moment and deservedly returned to the top of the podium.

"I wasn't sure if it was going to happen or not because sometimes it's been close and something happened," he said. "With five laps to go, it was going to be OK because I knew my tyres were still OK and once they got close enough, it's so difficult to follow. It was a great day to prove some people wrong and have a good race, but it doesn't really change anything for me. It's just a number. Life goes on."

Life at Ferrari will only go on three more races for Raikkonen. This might well be his last grand prix win, and certainly it's among his hardest-earned, but it's a reminder that on his day he's still capable of delivering the drive of a champion.