A Step Forward
Cue the celebrations for Williams Racing at the British Grand Prix.
After a grueling start to the season that James Vowles has mainly chalked up to being comprehensively outdeveloped by rivals, it was a truly solid performance from both drivers to secure P9 for Alex Albon and narrowly miss out on points for Logan Sargeant.
Moreover, the car was competitive with the cars around them throughout the entire race. While the true test is going to be if this pace can be translated to circuits with different profiles, this was a well-driven race and one that should rightly be celebrated in Grove.
Alex and Logan both qualified well, in P9 and P12 respectively. I’ll admit to dubious feelings about how they would get on in the race itself but I can’t claim an iota of data backing up those feelings. Of the two drivers, I would have expected Logan to fall back from Alex in racing conditions but that never meaningfully materialized.
I’ll have to see the post-race comments to know more, but the issues with the front and rear of the car that Alex reported early on surely cost him time and pace. Whether it would have been enough to challenge and secure higher places is anyone’s guess but I suspect there may be a sense that sniping one of the Aston Martin’s could have been on the cards.
James’ “line in the sand” comments on Logan were met with a very strong drive from the American and while his time with the team will be up at the end of the year, drives like this will be enough to ensure he doesn’t depart any earlier than that.
Formula 2
In the Formula 2 sprint on Saturday, it was the first wet race in the series this season and Zak O’Sullivan had the worst of it. With a red flag flying in the earlier stages, Franco Colapinto ran sixth and Zak was P11.
On lap 16, Zak made contact with Victor Martins, ending the Williams Academy driver’s race. Franco would go on to finish fifth.
In the feature race, Zak started in 19th due to a five-place grid penalty for his contact with Martins in the sprint and would recover to 11th, while Franco started fourth and finished fourth.
Franco is showing brilliant consistency at the moment, capturing what’s on offer and locking himself in among the best drivers in the series.
Formula 3
Luke Browning took pole in Formula 3 qualifying and lost a couple places in the early stages. Contact with Tim Tramnitz would relegate them both to the back of the field, with Luke finishing 24th.
The feature race was the bigger disaster for Luke, as he started on pole but changing weather conditions and imperfect strategy calls dropped him down the order, finishing eighth and going from championship leader to third in the campaign in the space of a race weekend.