Rain washed away half of the sessions at COTA last weekend, but as an American headed into his first home Grand Prix, it didn't dampen my enthusiasm for something I've been working towards since I was a teen.

The Formula 1 event in Austin was harder to keep track of than usual because the weather kept changing the schedule and I had to be at the ready to jump in the car at a moment's notice. I haven't been in Formula 1 for long, but if felt like we were part of something you don't see very often.

You go into a Formula 1 weekend with a really specific plan for literally every lap you turn, and your days are scheduled almost down to the minute. There's no question about where you need to be or what you should be doing from the moment you arrive to the moment you leave, which made all of the standing around waiting out the rain showers quite strange.

Having qualifying postponed until Sunday morning was another situation where everybody on pit lane just had to roll with the changes, and I was obviously happy to qualify ahead of my teammate. As it turned out, the race was better than anyone could have anticipated because of the changing conditions, and I think for the fans who turned out to see it live, it hopefully made up for everything we lost on Friday and Saturday.

My start had its challenges; I take full responsibility for hitting my teammate Will Stevens from behind, and it clearly wasn't on purpose. We had Felipe Massa spun at the top of the hill, I had Carlos Sainz on my side, Will was ahead and tried to go inside Massa, and I just misjudged the situation and hit him. He cut a tire, and it was unfortunate it happened to our sister car. Without that contact, I think both of us could have been in good positions at the finish.

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There was a lot of carnage throughout the race, and I was 100 percent aware of my position and how I kept moving up as cars fell out. The best part of my race was when the circuit was damp because I could make more of a difference and had a nice battle with Felipe Nasr where we overtook each other three or four times. We did that until things dried out and the Sauber pulled away. As cars dropped out and we had a number of virtual safety cars, I could look at the Jumbotrons around the track and keep up with where I was in the order.

Even after we were all on slicks, there were four corners that stayed wet so you'd get into pretty big four-wheel drifts each lap and I think that's why we saw so many collisions and crashes. It looked like we had a remote chance of scoring points, but settled with 12th in the end, which quals the best result the team's had so far this year.

It was a weekend of really great, really personal memories for me. Walking into the garage to see the Manor team had done the rear wing endplates in the stars and stripes was incredible; I didn't know about it beforehand, and as the only American attachment they have, I wasn't expecting them to do anything special just for me. But they did and I really appreciated it. The fans loved seeing the American flag on track and very much appreciated the team's gesture.

Another cool thing for me was to see so many people wearing Manor hats or t-shirts with my name on them and supporting the team. If you're one of the guys who've been in Formula 1 for a long time, I'd guess you're accustomed to fans supporting you wherever you go and having your name all over the place, but it's new for me and spoke to the passion people have for this sport and also having an American to root for. It's quite humbling.

I'm about to board my flight for Mexico where rain is expected again, so who knows what the event will have in store for us.

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If it's like COTA, I'll be pleased.

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