05/11/2024
NEWS STORY
Interlagos carnage leaves Williams with a monumental task ahead of final triple-header.
It's fair to say that the Sao Paulo weekend was a nightmare for the Grove outfit.
In Sunday morning's rescheduled qualifying session Alex Albon and Franco Colapinto both crashed out and such was the damage the Thai driver's car couldn't be repaired in time to start the race.
A few hours later Colapinto had his second crash of the weekend meaning that Williams not only left Brazil point-less but with a hefty repair bill, which, much like the situation at Mercedes, could compromise the team's upgrade programme for the remaining races.
Making matters worse was the fact that in finishing with both its drivers on the podium, Alpine leapfrogged the Grove outfit leaving it ninth in the team standings.
"The nature of Formula 1 is that you can have some of the most incredible feelings and results, as well as some of the lowest moments that you can feel within a sport," admitted team boss, James Vowles.
"I think it's fair to say this weekend is the second of those two," he added.
"We've had three incredibly large crashes in just a few hours from one another and have a tremendous amount of work to get ourselves back on top of our spares situation before we go to Las Vegas in just a few weeks' time.
"We must go to every single one of these weekends now and deliver everything possible, whilst making sure we are still looking ahead towards 2025 and 2026 because that, as I've said all along, is where our goal is truly set.
"It's all about getting the foundations right as we go towards that '26 region," he insisted. "But that doesn't make today any less painful. Far from it, I'm hurting right now. But I wanted to watch that race to the finish to make sure I remember today because this isn't what I want us to be feeling in the future."
Despite the pain and frustration, Vowles paid tribute to his French rivals.
"Our rivals, Alpine, were quick in the race, no doubt about it," he said. "They deserved those positions, but they scored a huge bag of points, putting them back up into a very high championship position and demoting us back down to ninth.
"I never give up until it's time to give up and that won't be until we're in Abu Dhabi and the chequered flag has dropped. We have two fast drivers, and we have a fast car underneath us."