‘Someone who will push Alex Albon along’: Williams highlight the qualities they are looking for in a Nicholas Latifi replacement
Follow Us
Alex Albon
When it was announced that Nicholas Latifi will not be staying at Williams for 2023, there were a number of proposed candidates: Nyck de Vries was the frontrunner. He had been rumoured to be their planned replacement for the Canadian for quite a few months, but rather ironically his outing with Williams in Monza helped him get a seat at AlphaTauri, where he will replace Pierre Gasly from next year.
That still leaves them with a few candidates, including Logan Sargeant and Mick Schumacher, and a far-fetched shot at Daniel Ricciardo. But even they have catches. Logan Sargeant must finish 5th or above in F2 to have the required super license points to compete in F1 – the gap from 3rd to 6th is only 9 points, with one race left. Mick Schumacher may extend with Haas. Daniel Ricciardo had said it’s likely he’ll have to sit 2023 out.
As per RaceFans, Williams’ head of vehicle performance, Dave Robson highlighted that the team are looking for someone that can compete with Alex Albon: “We need someone who will push Alex along and will be fighting with him every race. Ideally someone who is after similar traits from the car. We’ll see where we go. But all we want to do is have two competitive cars pushing each other into Q2, Q3 and beyond.”
Robson compares Alex Albon with George Russell
When George Russell’s hotly-anticipated move to Mercedes finally took place, Alex Albon was brought in as the replacement. The Thai driver had big shoes to fill. Mr. Saturday had been comfortably outperforming his teammate and earned praise for his performances. Dave Robson feels that Albon has done well.
Robson said of Albon: “It was a shame to lose George and all of the input that he’d had but Alex has jumped in, he’s got experience of what quick cars feel like and he’s fitted in very well. And he strikes that right balance as well, I think, between understanding what’s possible, but at the same time pushing and motivating everybody. So he’s a great influence and he works hard and really pushes us along.”
But at the same time, Albon and Russell are quite different in terms of their personality traits: “In terms of what they’re trying to achieve, then yes, of course, they [Albon and Russell] are very similar, similarly motivated and they want to achieve the same thing. In terms of their personality traits, then they’re quite different.”
Robson said that Albon is, ‘quiet’, ‘friendly’ and ‘mild-mannered’ but that does not mean the driver doesn’t push as hard. He concluded by saying that the enthusiasm of the two manifests in different ways, but: “There’s enough similarities there that Alex can push us along and pick up where George left off.”
Also Read: “In the end, it’s my mistake,” Alex Albon admits to his ‘costly error’ at the Singapore GP
Stay Updated!
/techfirstnow/media/agency_attachments/kATjCXskQdJKkXN0OuqW.png)