Williams’ Disastrous Weekend In Australia.
This was probably Williams‘ most disastrous weekend ever. Thanks to Alexander Albon’s accident, the team found itself forced to make an important decision. This resulted in Sargeant being excluded from the race to try and maximize points as much as possible.
March 25, 2024
Siria Famulari
Last Word On Sports

Williams found itself having to face a fairly complex and unexpected weekend. In fact, during the first free practice session, Alexander Albon ended up heavily against the wall. This caused great damage to the car. The situation then worsened when Williams deemed it impossible to repair the car. This is because Williams found itself without a new spare chassis.

Alexander Albon risked seeing himself sitting on the bench, without the possibility of being able to compete. Instead, the opposite happened. Williams, in fact, after a difficult and controversial decision, decided to entrust Logan Sargeant’s FW46 to his teammate Alexander Albon. Thus leaving Sargeant on the sidelines.

This was perhaps one of the doubly painful races for Alexander Albon. On one hand, the media pressure pointed out that the driver not only made a mistake by destroying the car but also found themselves lucky enough to be able to drive anyway, leaving his teammate on foot. On the other hand, the pressure from those who believe he could bring points home after the team has bet everything on him, sacrificing his teammate Logan Sargeant.

‘Williams’ Disastrous Weekend’;

https://lastwordonsports.com/motorsp...-in-australia/


Alex Albon admits Williams atmosphere ‘not pleasant’ amid fallout of Logan Sargeant swap
23 Mar 2024 9:19 AM
Henry Valantine
PlanetF1.com

Alex Albon acknowledged a “not pleasant” atmosphere in the Williams garage, after team-mate Logan Sargeant made way for the weekend with the one remaining chassis at the team.

“So, obviously the atmosphere and the environment that we’re in is not pleasant. We don’t want it to happen again. Obviously, we’re still waiting on that spare chassis. Hopefully the tracks that are coming up aren’t as difficult or let’s say punishing.”

‘Waiting on that spare chassis’;

https://www.planetf1.com/news/alex-a...ere-unpleasant


Williams took the Brawn GP 'no spare chassis' gamble — and lost
March 27th 2024
Author: Mark Hughes
Motor Sport Magazine

Honda had pulled out in the wake of the global financial crisis, when car sales had dropped off a cliff. But this coincided with its F1 team finally having a world-beater in its wind tunnel after years of under-achievement. Brawn and Fry had negotiated the continuation of the team so that car could see the light of day – and in the process had given it a better engine. But it was running on little more than the promise of the future.

Over 40% of the staff had been made redundant, there was a small amount of Honda continuation money (essentially the money saved by not paying 100% of the staff redundancies) in the pot and Fry was busy pulling in race-by-race sponsors. But there was no development budget, no business class flights, no frills whatsoever. Button had agreed to a cut on the big Honda retainer he’d been on, Rubens Barrichello signed a very cheap new deal. And there would be no spare car for at least the first third of the season. Parts were in super-short supply.

Brawn’s race strategist was James Vowles, who’d been with the team since its BAR days beginning 10 years earlier. From only rarely having had a competitive car to race, to facing redundancy, he was now looking at being the strategy chief over a car so good the challenge was not to lose the race. Vowles referred back to that lack of spare chassis last weekend. Now team principal at Williams, he has overseen a revolution in the ancient working methods of the team. Doing so seriously delayed the building of the cars pre-season.

‘Brawn GP 'no spare chassis' gamble’;

https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/a...?nowprocket=1#


F1 Australian Grand Prix Notebook: No Quick Fix to Williams Car Shortage
Nikita Mazepin, Formula 1 exhibition in North America, Oliver Bearman and more in this week's wrap-up.
MAR 25, 2024 1:24 PM EST
PHILLIP HORTON
AuotWeek.

Williams Will Be a Car Short in Japan, Too. Williams will again be without a spare chassis at the next round of the season in Japan. Formula 1 teams are permitted to have a third chassis available at each Grand Prix, which can be built up into an operational car if one of the two race chassis are written off in practice or qualifying. But Williams has not been able to take a third chassis to a grand prix so far in 2024.

“There’s a finite amount of resource and as we were going through an inefficient structure and making transformation at the same time, we started to cause problems,” he said. “In this particular case, the third chassis started to get delayed and delayed and delayed, and I think one of the things were transparent about is we were very late with these cars.”

“Very, very late. We pushed everything to the absolute limit. The fallout of that is we didn’t have a spare chassis. Now even then it was intended to be coming here at round three, but it got delayed and delayed again as other items got pushed back as a result.”

‘No Quick Fix to Williams Car Shortage’;

https://www.autoweek.com/racing/form...prix-notebook/


James Vowles grilled on ‘damaging’ Logan Sargeant call in spiky Ted Kravitz interview
23 Mar 2024 3:42 AM
Michelle Foster
PlanetF1.com

James Vowles admits his decision to give Alex Albon Logan Sargeant’s car not only hurt the American driver, but it may not be the last time as Williams still won’t have a spare chassis available in Japan. Sky Sports’ Ted Kravitz grilled Vowles in the Albert Park paddock on Saturday morning, asking if the potential damage was worth a point.

“For the benefit of maybe, maybe one point, if nothing happens to the RBs or anything like that, to hurt Logan’s confidence and his credibility, to undermine your decision to keep him for this year anyway, to maybe damage your relationship with your US owners and your US sponsors, and maybe damage your relationship with the fans as well, who many don’t think this a fair decision, is it really worth it?” quizzed the pit lane reporter.

“I wouldn’t have made this decision if it wasn’t, Ted,” Vowles replied. “We hurt an individual whose job it is to perform [at] the highest level, and anything that stops you from that puts you on the back foot, there’s no doubt about it.

‘Spiky Ted Kravitz interview’;

https://www.planetf1.com/news/james-...vitz-interview


Max Verstappen jokes he would ‘flatten’ his car and leave in Logan Sargeant’s position
23 Mar 2024 1:46 PM
Jamie Woodhouse
PlanetF1.com

Max Verstappen sympathises with the sidelined Logan Sargeant, saying he “would be on the plane home right now” if he were in the Williams driver’s position.

Red Bull’s three-time World Champion Verstappen said he would be catching his flight home early in Sargeant’s situation, joking he’d also wreck his car before it could be given to his team-mate. From the performance aspect, I understand it of course, but that does not take away from the fact that this obviously sucks for Logan,” Verstappen is quoted by AD.

“I am obviously not in that position, but I would be on the plane home right now. If that happened to me I would also completely flatten mine, nobody can drive [laughs]. But in my situation, of course, that’s really not going to happen, which I think also makes sense.”

“On the plane home right now”;

https://www.planetf1.com/news/max-ve...eant-situation