Heading into the glamorous F1 Las Vegas GP, Williams and Alex Albon is keen to produce a turnaround after failing to score a single point in Brazil. With three rounds to go, the Grove-based team, however, is set to finish the 2024 F1 season in a lowly ninth place.
Alex Albon, in particular, thrived over a single lap on the wet track in the F1 Brazil GP. He was P2 on the timing page before suffering a huge crash during the final segment of the heavily disrupted qualifying session.
The Thai-British driver was due to start the race from P7 on the grid. Unfortunately, Williams’ mechanics were unable to repair his heavily damaged FW46 in time. As a result, Albon failed to participate in the F1 Brazil GP earlier in the month.
Ahead of the F1 Las Vegas GP, Albon addressed his disappointing weekend in Brazil and how the team has gained further insight into the issue.
Takeaway from São Paulo before the F1 Las Vegas GP
Albon had lost the rear of the car as he approached the Senna S and suffered a sizeable impact with the barriers in Q3.
Alex Albon: “Did the brakes fail?”
Engineer: “We’re checking. Oh Alex, are you okay?”
AA: “Yeah.”
Engineer: “We’re checking on the brakes. From our side, brakes look okay, if you can still hear me.”
Speaking on Wednesday, Albon suggested that they could’ve avoided his qualifying mishap at Interlagos by tweaking a few settings on the car.
“I think the one [crash in Q3] in Brazil was understood.
“We understood the difference in circuit, ambient conditions. In those conditions, we realised if we did that weekend again, we would have changed quite a few things, systems, electronics in the car, and it would have likely evaded the lock-up into Turn 1.”
Reason behind the shunt in Brazil
Albon had expressed his frustrations throughout qualifying over front locking and how it made the car rather difficult to drive.
When asked to elaborate on the problems he had encountered in Brazil and how they resulted in him losing control of the car, the 28-year-old attributed the incident to a braking anomaly.
Albon also underscored the unique nature of the Interlagos circuit and the way it requires drivers to brake in certain sectors of the track. Dismissing the exclusivity of the complication, he claimed that several other teams were encountering brake lock-up issues.
Furthermore, the Williams driver offered his assurance that they are unlikely to face similar troubles in Las Vegas after combing through the data and retuning the car.
“I don’t want to say too much, but we went into the weekend with some [concerns].
“That track is very unique in terms of the way that you brake, and I think there were other teams possibly struggling as well. I think there were a lot of braking issues within Brazil.
“We went through the data and we realised just the behaviour of the brakes weren’t as they have been all year. And it created a situation where, basically, the crash happened.
“Everything, for this weekend, we’ve readjusted, retuned everything.
“I don’t think you will see the issue because this track is not going to be wet, or like Brazil. But it should mean that whenever we go back into those conditions again, we won’t have the same issue.”
