There was a gap of a month after the Italian Grand Prix before the teams gathered at Watkins Glen. The Maki, BRM and Surtees teams did not make the trip and Hill and Ensign sent only one drivers each. Chris Amon had hurt his leg in a road accident at the Long Beach Formula 5000 event. March decided to run only two cars for Hans-Joachim Stuck and Vittorio Brambilla and so Lella Lombardi moved to the second Williams. Wilson Fittipaldi was back in action in the Fittipaldi, having overcome his hand injuries, while Brian Henton was back in the second Lotus in place of Jim Crawford. Tyrrell entered its third car for Elf protege Michel Leclère while Surtees driver John Watson had been taken on to drive for Penske.

It was no surprise that the new World Champion Niki Lauda took pole position in his Ferrari. Alongside him on the front row was Emerson Fittipaldi's McLaren while the second row featured Carlos Reutemann (Brabham) and Jean-Pierre Jarier (Shadow). On the third row Mario Andretti (Parnelli) lined up alongside Brambilla while Tom Pryce (Shadow) shared the fourth with Patrick Depailler (Tyrrell). Jochen Mass (McLaren) and Jody Scheckter (Tyrrell) completed the top 10. James Hunt was surprisingly off the pace in his Hesketh, lining up 15th on the grid.

Lauda won the race to the first corner and the Ferrari and Fittipaldi then drove away from the rest of the field, leaving Jarier to lead the hunt ahead of Brambilla, Reutmann, Andretti and a charging James Hunt. The order remained unchanged at the front from flag to flag with Lauda winning by five seconds. Jarier retired on lap 19 with a wheel failure but as Reutemann and Andretti had both gone out with mechanical troubles it was Hunt who emerged in third place at the head of a battling group consisting of Mass, Ronnie Peterson (Lotus) and Scheckter. Mass managed to pass Hunt in the mid-race to take third place. On lap 50 Hunt was overtaken by Peterson but the Englishman reclaimed fourth place on the final lap. The pair finished with Scheckter right on their tail.