The Japanese GP at the Suzuka Circuit experienced a chaotic free practice sessions Friday, although it was clean for Williams. While FP1 ran clearly without any incidents, FP2 witnessed four red flags due to Jack Doohan’s crash, Fernando Alonso’s beached car and fire on the grass. The constant red flags in the session limited drivers to go for longer runs and collect crucial data to decide their strategy for the race on Sunday.
The Atlassian Williams Racing duo, Carlos Sainz and Alex Albon, concluded both sessions in P10 and P11, respectively. In the FP1, they commenced with medium tyres and switched to softs later on. The pair completed a representative soft tyre run despite undergoing a messy free practice session.
There will be an overnight shift for the Williams crew
Alex Albon finishing both practice sessions right after his teammate Carlos Sainz with the times of 1:29.392 and 1:29.023, stated that they currently do not have the car they want.
The Thai driver admitted not being able to collect enough data about the situation of the car due to constant disruptions in the FP2. Nevertheless, he further mentioned that they will focus on improving the car overnight and make the necessary changes for a better performance.
“Maybe [we] need the sprinklers out a little bit. But generally speaking, it’s okay.
“I don’t think we’ve got the car that we want underneath us at the minute, so we’ll do a bit of tuning tonight.
“Obviously {FP2] has been very disjointed, so there’s not much data to look at. But we know where we need to improve, so we will make some changes.”
The car feels good, the future looks promising for Williams ahead of the F1 Japanese GP
The Thai driver started the 2025 F1 season strongly by garnering important points for his team. He finished 5th in Melbourne and 7th in Shanghai. Albon expressed his confidence in the team’s current momentum in an interview. He claimed that they will score even more points on the Sunday Race.
“I’m confident. I think we can score some points this weekend. Feeling good in the car.”
Positive FP1, Limited FP2
The other half of Williams team, Carlos Sainz reflected on the Friday free practice sessions in an interview. The Spaniard remarked that the team tested couple of things with their F1 challenger FW47, facilitating his adaptation to the car.
Though Sainz commented positively on FP1, he reckoned the chaos happened during FP2. Despite changing and trying to fix the car’s problems, they couldn’t feel the progress. The Spaniard admitted that the red flags played a huge part in limiting the course of improvements.
Carlos Sainz finished FP1 with a time of 1:29.333 and FP2 with 1:28.832, ahead of his teammate. He came in P10 in both sessions.
“From my side, it was a positive FP1 because we managed to test a few things in the car and keep my adaptation going.
“Then obviously FP2 [was] very disrupted. We changed a few things again, trying to go in the direction we want to go. But we couldn’t really feel it.
“All these red flags during the rest of the session didn’t allow us to see if the changes we made to the car were in the positive direction.
“We also had a bit of an issue at the beginning of FP2, but that got solved later.”
Sainz also commented on Doohan’s crash in the FP2, describing it as super scary, and wished him a quick recovery.
“We couldn’t really get a taste of it due to first Jack’s crash, that looks super scary. I wish he’s okay, because it looked like a really big one. Glad he got out of the car. Wish him a quick recovery.”
Sainz expects a “hectic” FP3 session
The Spanish driver recognized the banked testing expectations of teams for the FP3 session after going through a rather limited FP2 with four red flags. He predicted that it is going to be a busy final Saturday free practice for all teams.
Carlos Sainz said that due to a big wind direction change on Saturday, the car will feel completely different. However, he stated that they will do their best to achieve a successful final practice.
“I think it’s going to be a hectic FP3 for everyone tomorrow.
“There’s a lot of things to test. We’re gonna try to nail it.
“It’s a big wind direction change tomorrow so the car’s gonna feel very different. Let’s see.”
