Although he said he had a lot of fun at last Sunday’s Belgian Grand Prix, Alexander Albon feels he was caught in a loop during the race, which could also serve as a warning for Williams.
The Williams drivers were looking forward to the Belgian Grand Prix with confidence, and Albon had a great start to Sunday’s main race: he started on the soft tyres, and they worked great on his car, which he was able to use and came from the end of the middle field to the front. In contrast, he lost his pace in the intermediate stages and finished only 14th in a race that started promisingly.
The biggest problem for the team and therefore Albon was the tire wear being much greater than expected. They have since realized that the lack of downforce in the second sector caused the tires to overheat and lose grip quickly. The Thai pilot was unable to counter this.
Regarding the good start and rapid decline, Albon commented that he felt like he was going around in circles at Spa, and Williams should learn from that. “I was almost surprised that I got out of the points zone in my intermediate stage; I didn’t know when almost everyone passed me“, the young driver told RacingNews365.
“At the end of the stage we had tire wear. It was a difficult race because we drove with low downforce. It’s fun in some ways, but it wasn’t as much fun in the second sector. We simply wore out the tires. We tried this even in the wet.” pointed out.
“It was a wake-up call for the team about tire wear. Especially what we saw on the media. The other problem was that I had to fight in the second sector, while in the same place I had to pay attention to the tires. I was immediately shot at and was overtaken almost immediately.” . He looked back.
“I had to go hard on the tires and it was a vicious cycle because it made them worse while you were trying to save them. But you can’t do that, that freedom is not there. It wasn’t like in Canada or Austria or Silverstone, where I felt like I had to protect the tires in “Some corners. They (the others) were behind me the whole time, so I had to keep the throttle.” He explained his dilemma.
“It’s frustrating because we thought we could do better this weekend. We need to make sure we understand why we struggled so much. Ultimately, the downforce will be the same in Monza. That will be the next good opportunity to score points, so we have to learn.” “From the end of this week so that it doesn’t happen again when we race on tracks that suit us.” He concluded his thought.
Alexander Albon (Photo: XPB)
