Williams two seconds from the top
Carlos Sainz he had explained on the eve that winter in Williams It’s been quite eventful and it’s no surprise that the English team isn’t particularly high at the end of free practice on Friday in Australia. Alexander Albon finished FP2 in 15th position, Carlos Sainz did little lap in the second session due to problems that emerged on his FW48. Below are the statements of the English driver and the head of track engineering Angelos Tsiaparas.
Alexander Albon: “We knew that the first race weekend with the new rules would still be a challenge, so it wasn’t an easy day. We had some difficulties with some of the data and with the set-up of the car, but we will analyze what we learned in both free practice sessions and see how to apply it tomorrow. We need to work to understand the use of energy on this track and what is the most efficient way to use and recover it. We will spend much of the night working with the simulator team to find simulation tools that will help us put developing a better set-up for tomorrow. There is a lot to improve before qualifying, but it’s all part of the learning process.”
Angelos Tsiaparas: “Melbourne poses particular challenges in terms of energy and distribution with the new regulations: it is one of the circuits that we define as ‘energy poor’, so much of the attention from an engineering point of view has been focused on the driving styles and techniques we can develop to maximize energy collection and distribution. Tomorrow we will have another free practice session to try to optimize all this ahead of qualifying. What we observed in testing in Bahrain remains valid: the top four teams are leading and the midfield is very compact, so our aspiration is to try to be at the top of the midfield weekend after weekend.”
