It was a really tough weekend in Melbourne for Williams. The English team, which arrived in Australia still lacking in points, experienced a nightmare Saturday with Nicholas Latifi sent to the wall by Stroll due to a misunderstanding between the two Canadians and Alexander Albon disqualified at the end of the round for lack of the minimum quantity of fuel required.
The Anglo-Thai, who started from the last position on the grid, managed to overturn the situation in the race with an extreme strategy. Starting with the hard Pirelli, Albon covered 57 laps on the same compound before making the obligatory stop at the last lap, mounting the soft tires, and crossing the finish line in tenth position.
Albon was thus able to give Williams the first point of the year and celebrated this result with the smile of the best days.
“I’m really happy with today’s result, especially considering our predictions for the race. It was a race where we had to take risks because we had nothing to lose. We took the time to get the tires in the right window of use, and this is something you can afford when you start from the bottom ”.
“Then it got better and better and the last 25 laps of the race felt like qualifying laps. It was an unexpected result but one that highlights all the work done in the factory and on the track. I’m happy to have obtained this result for the whole team ”.
Alex Albon, Williams FW44, Esteban Ocon, Alpine A522
Photo by: Mark Sutton / Motorsport Images
The former Red Bull driver then explained how this strategy was not studied at the table but was decided lap after lap by analyzing Williams’ behavior.
“To be honest I have to say that it was not decided a priori. I was surprised at the failure to enter the pits both on the occasion of the Virtual Safety Car and of the two safety cars. I thought they knew something at the wall that I didn’t know. When I no longer had one of the two Haas in front of me I managed to do my race and ran away from the pursuers ”.
“I had older tires than the others, but I was able to lap about the same times as the McLarens. The interesting thing is that the C2 compound is really suitable for our car, even if we still don’t understand why ”.
The punticino collected today represents a great result for Williams after a more complicated start to the championship than expected. Albon hopes this result will entice the team and push the whole team to work hard to move up the rankings.
“Such a result is really useful. When you have such a difficult start to the season you try in every way to find the positive aspects. Of course, when you don’t get good results you always experience a complicated situation, but this moment motivates me and this point represents a stimulus for the whole team ”.
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