Red Bull suggests bumpy COTA caused crack in Verstappen's wing ahead of US GP

Aston Martin Red Bull Racing believes the controversial bumps on the Circuit of the Americas resulted in a broken rear wing on Max Verstappen's F1 car prior to the United States Grand Prix. The track is scheduled to be resurfaced during the winter months after it received many complaints across the weekend. 

On the grid ahead of lights out, a Red Bull Racing mechanic spotted the crack. Team boss Christian Horner reports the story, but Horner doesn't seem too angry about the situation and is confident the problems will be fixed. 

“We discovered a small hairline crack. It would have probably been okay, but we got permission from the FIA to do a precautionary change going into the race. So it well spotted by the mechanic," Horner told RaceFans.net. 

"I think the viciousness of the bumps around here are pretty aggressive. The circuit’s advised us that there’s a significant amount of resurfacing as well as rectification works that need to go on. The bumps have got more severe in recent times with extremes of weather they’ve had here. To their credit, they undertook a lot of rectification work that could be done without compromising the track surface as much as possible," Horner added. 

Sebastian Vettel's suspension failed early in the Grand Prix. It's unclear what exactly caused this to happen, but it's likely to be linked with the bumps. Verstappen went on to complete the race and finish on the podium. He was hunting down Lewis Hamilton in the closing stages of the race and would have had a chance to overtake for 2nd place had their not been yellow flags on the last lap.