The United States Grand Prix marks the fourth Grand Prix the Argentinian has taken part in this season since he was announced to replace Logan Sargeant starting from the Italian Grand Prix. It also marks the second time he has finished in the points.
Williams did not have an easy weekend in Austin, despite Colapinto ending up in P10 during Sprint qualifying. The 21-year-old only managed to place P12 during the Sprint Race as he lacked the pace of the cars around him, such as the Haas’ and Yuki Tsunoda.
The day only got worse for the team with both drivers getting kicked out of Q1, as Colapinto was just 0.011s slower than his Thai stablemate.
Despite a difficult and disappointing Saturday, the Williams driver drove fantastically, ending the race in points at P10.
Colapinto recounted his race and explained the decision to start on hards. Despite losing a place on the opening tour, he jumped Hamilton, Stroll and Zhou as all three made unforced errors.
From there, he passed Fernando Alonso on lap 23 to take P10 as he kept on going strongly, showing good pace and tyre management. He eventually pitted on lap 40 to switch to the mediums.
After fending off an aggressive Magnussen for a couple of laps, he caught and cleared Tsunoda and Gasly to make his way into the points, crossing the line just 1.4s behind Liam Lawson at the end.
“Yeah, I am happy. It was a very tough Saturday for us, and I think we knew that we had the pace in the car to be strong and to do a good race.
“That’s why I decided to start on the hard, to have a bit of clean air. I thought maybe it was not ideal, but I knew that having the pace we had, it was going to be better for us to try and have that pace in the clean air, and do the jump on the track whilst we were in that sequence.
“To be honest, first when we were in clean air on the hards, we were really strong, and then once we put the mediums, we were flying.”
“It was great to see how we bounced back today and how we came back stronger after a very difficult day yesterday.
“It was a tough Saturday for the team, but they deserved the point of today and they worked hard for it, so it’s well deserved.”
In fact, the Argentinian even managed to hold onto the fastest lap point for a while as he did a 1:36.611. However, Alpine’s decision to pit Estaban Ocon for new softs on lap 51, allowed the Frenchman to take away the bonus point from him.
Colapinto isn’t discouraged though as he believes it shows Williams are clearly ahead of Alpine in pace as they continue to battle for P8 in the Constructors’ Championship.
“Well, we had the fastest lap, I mean that he took it out with new tyres, it’s not about being very close, I think.
“I did it many laps earlier on an older tyre, and I think we just had a much better pace than them.
“And then they just had to put a new set with low fuel to try to take it from us, so I think they weren’t close to us in terms of pace. But look, it’s part of racing.
“I was happy for the fastest lap and I wanted to keep it, but look, it’s fine.
“We had it for a while. It’s a point that we lost, but I’m sure that we are going to recover it soon.
“We had a good car and we are capable of scoring points, so we are going to come back stronger, I’m sure of that.”
This was Colapinto’s first Sprint weekend in Formula One. Despite previous experience of two races in Formula 2, he admits he’ll need to manage things better in Brazil and Qatar to avoid burnout.
“It was busy.
“You get quite burned out, and it’s something I need to manage a bit more.
“The timings means I need to manage a bit more, the free time and try to be a bit more relaxed in the moments that I can be, because it is very busy.
“You are under a lot of pressure all the time, and I just need to try and understand how to manage that better in Brazil.”
The Williams’ driver was also showered with love and support from his fellow Argentinians at the track on Sunday, something he is clearly grateful for.
“It was insane. When we were going on the truck and doing laps, everyone was like, ‘how are there so many Argentinians? What’s happening? And they were like, oh, Franco, oh, Franco’.
“I was like, ‘wow’. It was very impressive, very nice to see.
“James [Vowles] is a bit worried. He says, ‘take care, take care’.
“It’s just a lot of things, and you are racing and you have a lot of pressure. My job is to do my thing on the track, and I’m going to try to show how much I care for the fans to be there.
“I’m going to enjoy, of course, my first race in Brazil, but also Mexico next weekend.”
