In the round-up: Williams team principal James Vowles says his driver choices for next season should show everyone the team is serious about becoming championship contenders again.
In brief
Williams ‘serious about fighting its way to the top’
Vowles successfully courted Carlos Sainz Jnr to join his team next year alongside Alexander Albon. He said he “didn’t hesitate” to describe the pairing as the strongest driver line-up in F1 and called it a statement of intent about their aims to fight for championships.
“There’s no politics between them, they both want the team to be successful, which means they’ll be pushing the team forward rather than fighting against each other,” Vowles told Nailing the Apex. “And that’s a very different dynamic when you’re inside a team, creating that.
What it means is we have the best possibility of creating the platform for them where we can move up to start fighting for championships. Now, have no doubt, when you’re fighting for a championship and you’ll see this time and time again, that is hard to maintain as a structure. But I think I have the two drivers where it’s entirely possible to maintain.
“But the reason for really drawing a line underneath it, and showing a line-up of the quality that we have, is because I want the world to recognise and realise this is a different Williams. This is a Williams that is serious about fighting its way to the top.”
Tsolov on top at Catalunya
Nikola Tsolov posted the quickest times in the morning and afternoon sessions in Formula 3’s test at the Circuit de Catalunya. The Campos driver’s 1’27.866 during the first part of the test stood as the day’s quickest time.
The test was red-flagged once when Ivan Domingues slid off at turn three. The teams will conclude their two-day test today.
Crawford samples Aston Martin
Aston Martin junior driver Jak Crawford got behind the wheel of one of the team’s cars in a demonstration run ahead of this weekend’s race at Austin.
Bearman’s brother gets F4 drive
Oliver Bearman’s younger brother Thomas will race for Hitech in the British Formula 4 championship next year. He made his debut in the category at the end of this season, scoring a best finish of ninth.
“During the two British F4 rounds and the Euro 4 event, I really gained a lot of confidence and by the season finale in Brands Hatch, I was feeling really at home in the car and the team,” he said.
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Links
Antonelli: My greatest influences (F2)
‘I think Donington 1993 when (Ayrton Senna) won the race in the wet, almost lapping everyone. Then there’s also the Monaco lap. Or Jerez where he had two cars in front of him and had to avoid them but still put the car on pole. Spa when he jumped out the car to turn off the engine because he saw the driver wasn’t conscious. He was really special.’
F1 viewership analysis: Has the series cracked the US TV market? (Blackbook Motorsport)
‘In isolation, Formula 1’s growth is impressive, but it has only recently begun to generate the viewership numbers seen in IndyCar, which is arguably the most comparable series to Formula 1.’
Autumn sunshine (Substack)
‘As some of you will be aware, I created the Motorsport Broadcasting website (then The F1 Broadcasting Blog) back in 2012, owing to my love for all things motor sport and broadcasting. I still write content; however, the number of articles has diminished recently, and there’s a couple of reasons for that.’
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