Teams load up un ultrasofts for Austin, except McLaren

Pirelli's purple-rimmed ultrasoft tyre will be the compound of choice for the majority of teams at next week's US Grand Prix in Austin.

Force India, Williams and Sauber have chosen nine sets of the softest rubber that will be available at the Circuit of the Americas, while front-runners Mercedes and Ferrari will have seven sets allocated to their drivers with the exception of Sebastian Vettel who has chosen to go with eight sets of the ultrasoft.

Red Bull Racing has gone for a more cautionary approach however, with Daniel Ricciardo and Max Verstappen taking on six sets each.

At the other end of the spectrum, McLaren's approach is once again outright conservative, with Fernando Alonso and Stoffel Vandoorne receiving just five sets of ultrasofts, and counter-balancing that allocation with six sets of the soft compound.

The Woking-based outfit had made a similar call for the Japanese Grand Prix, stocking up on Pirelli's harder compounds for Suzuka on the assumption its car would perform better on the specific tyres.

McLaren sporting director Gil de Ferran later conceded it had been the wrong choice.

"I think earlier in the year, there was a general understanding that our car was working better with harder compounds, and particularly on this type of track, with very high Gs and a lot of sequence of corners, that it would be a more suitable choice," said de Ferran.

"I think quite frankly as it transpires, we got it wrong, and we have been spending the whole weekend trying to deal with a non-optimal choice that we’ve made. That’s all there is to it."

McLaren also denied rumors that it had omitted to submit on time its tyre choice for Suzuka, which led to reports that the outfit's selection in Japan had in fact been imposed by the FIA, hence its poor performance.

However, F1 race director Charlie Whiting contradicted the story.

"I was not made aware of anyone being late," said Whiting. “It is a long time ago anyway.

"What we would normally do is that if they haven’t selected it the day before, we would give them a quick call and say, ‘don’t forget you have to make your tyre choice’. But they are right on it."

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