Lewis Hamilton’s Halo earns its pay in Austin as carbon shrapnel whistles past
Turn 1 at COTA did what Turn 1 at COTA does. The Sprint start detonated into a three-car mess, two McLarens and Fernando Alonso were gone in a heartbeat, and Lewis Hamilton’s afternoon very nearly took a different turn when a jagged slab of carbon fired at his helmet.
Hamilton, starting eighth for Ferrari, threaded into the wide uphill left-hander behind the scrum of Lando Norris, Oscar Piastri, Nico Hülkenberg and Alonso taking alternate lines. Piastri and Hülkenberg clashed as the concertina hit, Alonso was tagged, and the ricochet shoved Piastri toward Norris. Both McLarens were out, Alonso too, and Hülkenberg tumbled down the order. Carlos Sainz popped up into third; Hamilton latched onto fourth.
Then came the heart-stopper. Hamilton’s onboard caught a chunky piece of debris slingshotting toward his visor before cannoning off the Halo and skipping over the cockpit. One more reason F1’s titanium wishbone remains the most valuable ugly duckling on the grid.
Here’s the moment, captured by Autosport:
Halo saving Lewis Hamilton from being struck by a piece of carbon fibre in Austin 🙏
— Autosport (@autosport)October 18, 2025
Hamilton, 40 and in scarlet for the first time at COTA, didn’t dwell on the near-miss, but he knew he’d dodged a pile-up and something worse at the same time.
“I managed to avoid the drama at Turn 1, just,” he told Sky F1. “I didn’t position my car particularly well. I saw Alonso on the inside so I went a bit to the right and left the door open to Charles. Lots of improvement is still to be made. Otherwise the start was good.”
He’ll line up fifth for Sunday’s 56-lap United States Grand Prix, with Charles Leclerc two spots ahead in third. It’s the closest Hamilton has felt to a Ferrari podium all year, and he wasn’t shy about the target.
“For us to be third and fifth I think it’s a real step forward,” he said. “This is the closest I’ve been [to a podium] in God knows how long. It’s taken me forever, it’s not from lack of trying. I’m going to give it absolutely everything to try and get there tomorrow. My goal is to win tomorrow.”
If Saturday’s scare felt familiar, it’s because Hamilton’s had the Halo save him before. Monza 2021 lives long in the memory: Max Verstappen’s Red Bull climbed over the Mercedes and came to rest on top, the right-rear wheel glancing Hamilton’s helmet. “Thank God for the Halo,” he said that day. He meant it.
Introduced in 2018, the Halo wasn’t universally loved at first. But the list of close calls and life-saving interventions grows with every season, a grim but necessary ledger. In Austin it did its job again, a thick shard of carbon redirected in a blink, a moment you only appreciate after the adrenaline settles.
As for the racing, the Sprint reset worked nicely for Ferrari after that opening-lap chaos, with Sainz inheriting track position and Hamilton sitting pretty to score. Sunday is the real prize, though. Ferrari’s long-run pace has looked tidy all weekend, and Hamilton’s starts have had bite. Fifth on the grid with clean air to chase and his teammate ahead as a carrot? That’s the kind of scenario he tends to convert when the car lets him.
Austin has a way of springing one more surprise, and the field will turn into that blind left at the top of the hill with Saturday’s shrapnel still fresh in the mind. Hamilton’s was a near miss you could hear — the thud of carbon on titanium — and one more reminder that the sport’s cleverest safety device keeps paying off in the moments you can’t predict.
