Williams look to be on a comeback charge after moving up to P8 in the Constructors’ Championship following an impressive double points finish in Baku.�
Williams’ weekend around the streets of Baku could not have got off to a more terrible start after Franco Colapinto crashed out in Free Practice One.
The Argentine made his F1 debut in Monza, finishing in P12 after it was announced that he would be replacing Logan Sargeant for the rest of the season.
However, during qualifying, Colapinto was able to bounce back and show a lot of confidence despite only being a Formula 1 driver for three weeks, as he made it into Q3 for the very first time.
The 21-year-old would even out-qualify his team-mate Alex Albon in just his second race weekend, as the pair would line up in P9 and P10 on the grid for Sunday’s race.
During the Azerbaijan Grand Prix, both Williams drivers were able to make their stints work. Despite Colapinto being out of the points for a proportion of the race, Sergio Perez and Carlos Sainz’s crash on the penultimate lap saw the newly appointed Williams driver get back into the points as he finished in P8.
Albon picked up his best result of the campaign to date as he came across the line just ahead of his team-mate in P7. This double points finish for the team is their first since the 2023 United States Grand Prix.
Williams now move above Alpine in the Constructors’ standings and are up to P8 in the Championship as they look to close the gap to Haas and RB ahead of them.
A dream come true for Colapinto
Speaking to formula1.com and the media after the race, Colapinto described his first points finish as a very special moment in his career and “a dream come true.”
“It feels fantastic to be honest,” he said after the race. “I am very happy, very proud of the team. What we have achieved together is incredible and I am delighted for the job and the work we have been doing.”
“A lot of effort goes into these points and we already climbed one position in the constructors’ championship and it’s only my second race together and we scored a lot of points together with Alex so it’s just an amazing result for the team. I am very happy for them, they deserve it so yeah, let’s keep going this way.”
“It is very special, a dream come true. It is a long season still and we have many races left together but it is a great start. Very motivating for the next race.”
Williams’ move to replace Sargeant with Colapinto looks to be the correct decision as the Argentinian has scored quadruple the number of points compared to the American in 34 fewer races.
Williams’ result a genuine surprise according to Albon
Also speaking to the media, Albon stated that the team’s impressive performance was “a genuine surprise” despite their upgrade package working well so far in the second half of the season.
“It was actually unexpected for us to be in that kind of awkward position where we were in the mix with the leaders,” he said. “Obviously we didn’t pit yet but we were losing a lot of race time because of all the fighting that was going on around me.”
“I didn’t expect it, we didn’t expect it, we thought we would have quite a simple race. I didn’t really know where my race was, I didn’t know where I was going to come out, it was all a little bit unknown. Honestly, we were okay in the second stint, I thought I could get Fernando [Alonso] but he had a great end to his race, he was quick at the end so didn’t quite get him.”
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