How Albon’s career stability is aiding Williams in its F1 recovery

On the Tuesday following the Canadian Grand Prix, Alex Albon received a call from his new boss. James Vowles dialled his driver’s number to let him know his Sunday effort was “a drive of champions”.

It was easy to see why Albon’s faultless drive, holding back four of his rivals in seemingly faster cars to bring home six points for seventh place, impressed. But that kind of praise, from someone who over the past 20 years had worked with Jenson Button, Michael Schumacher, Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton, isn’t something you hear after a race that is merely quite good.

“It’s always nice to receive positive feedback,” Albon smiles when GP Racing asks about that call. “We’re also interested to hear the negative feedback too, but it’s always good to hear the positive side. We talk about a lot of things, but 
it was nice to chat just about the Sunday.”

That seventh place was special for a whole number of reasons. Not only was it Albon’s best result so far as part of Williams, but it came after weeks of intense work at the team’s Grove factory. Owing to a lack of spares after the Barcelona round, Williams had to rush the upgrade package to be ready for Montreal, one of the tracks on the calendar that particularly suits the FW45.

New bits, fresh from the autoclave –
 a one-of-a-kind set – meant a decision had to be made. And, after the year and a half Albon has had at the team, it wasn’t one to agonise over – obviously, he would be the one tasked with validating and racing the upgrade.

A street track, one of the few weekends in the first half of the season promising a real chance to score points, an upgraded car, a lack of spares – and changeable conditions on top of all that...

Albon fended off the advances of several much faster cars to secure points with upgraded Williams package

Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images

“Yeah, it felt like there was a little bit of expectation and pressure, in some respects, to deliver because we put so much into it,” says Albon. “You know, James brought everyone together [at the factory] and explained the situation, that we need to work really hard to get this car ready. I was there in that chat – in some ways, I guess, trying to morale-boost everyone. I mean, the guys did an amazing job. I think our floor arrived on the plane – very, very late.

“People worked through the weekends for it. Obviously, you know, they have families, they had to sacrifice quite a lot for it. And it’s not an easy track to bring an upgrade to because… it’s got walls, it’s very bumpy. And the weather was not great. And we were putting slicks on in the rain and all these kinds of things.”

But it worked out pretty well. It seemed as if throughout the weekend Williams threw one challenge at Albon after another, and he met every one of them. The pressure of having the singular version of the updated car didn’t dissuade the team from giving Albon slicks and sending him out on a damp track in Q2 – and he topped that segment of qualifying.

"There’s no secret
 that last year, one of my main goals
 for the year was to make sure I stayed in F1. Sounds silly, but it’s the reality of it. To have that security is great, in such an unpredictable sport" Alex Albon

And even though his final starting position was ninth, in the race the team gave him another big task, opting for an ambitious one-stop strategy. It was the only one capable of delivering a good haul of points but, with that, it would demand Albon mount a 20-lap defence from cars on much fresher tyres.

It’s mainly those 20 laps, throughout which Albon denied George Russell and then Esteban Ocon, that made Vowles feel
 like he would have to give his driver a call a couple of days afterwards.

“To get the points and get the results,” smiles Albon, “there was a lot of happiness, a lot of passion in that. But also, just great to be able to turn what was a difficult situation into a great result and to repay everyone at the factory for that hard work.

“It’s always a dream scenario to be able to do that. And next Saturday we had a summer day for our team. So all the families, everyone came out, and even then it was like...
a fairytale. A perfect story.”

Albon feels content in his team leader position and its improving his performances

Photo by: Zak Mauger / Motorsport Images

The 2023 version of Alex Albon is a textbook example of a Formula 1 team leader. Experienced, fast, hardly makes any mistakes and maximises every opportunity to score. His season and a half at Williams has transformed perceptions of him – to the point where, in the paddock, Albon is now cited as the ideal team-mate to Russell should Lewis Hamilton decide to walk away from Mercedes after all. Over at Red Bull, Albon’s former boss Helmut Marko has openly lamented the fact that he can’t get him back until the start of 2025 at the earliest.

“I think last year was much more about having to prove myself,” says Albon. “I would say my stock was quite low, and it was trying to… Well, truthfully, the first goal is the obvious goal, it’s to stay in F1. Once you get there again, you want to glue your feet to the ground.”

He’s done it. Four years after his debut – a period that included a season and a half at Red Bull and a year on the sidelines – he can finally say he’s entrenched in F1. His performance last year was so convincing that Williams acted fast to remove him from the market just as that silly season became really silly. For the first time in his career, he has a multi-year deal.

“Until last year, I was always driving on a one-year contract,” he says. “That’s even from karting days. You never knew what next year was going to be like, there was never stability in my career.

“You spend your whole life in motorsport with this grey bubble around your head – at least I did, with a lack of funding and sponsors and whatever, no junior team for a good period of my career. You kind of get used to it, to some extent. It’s exactly the reason why it’s [the Netflix show] called Drive to Survive! But you’re so used to it, that it’s not such a big thing. And yet, once you do get that stability, it does feel good.

“I’ve said it before, but there’s no secret
 that last year, one of my main focuses, goals
 for the year was to make sure I stayed in F1. Sounds silly, but it’s the reality of it. To have that security is great, in such an unpredictable sport. So, yeah, I do enjoy it.”

The goals are different now. His performance relative to Nicholas Latifi – in qualifying and in races – was even more impressive than Russell’s before that. And this year, while Logan Sargeant is learning the ins and outs of F1, Albon has been taking Williams upwards in the constructors’ standings by himself. Three weeks after Canada, Albon finished eighth at Silverstone, pushing his team ahead of Haas and Alfa Romeo.

Albon is increasingly part of the furniture in F1 having achieved his goal of securing a multi-year deal

Photo by: Motorsport Images

So Vowles’ words that Albon is who he 
wants to build his team around shouldn’t come
 as much of a surprise.

“I’d say the biggest thing is the language and the kind of meetings we have,” says Albon of his changed approach. “For example, straight away, really early in this year, we’re already focusing on next year’s car. What does this year’s car do that we don’t want in next year’s car? We need to attack those areas early in the year, so we can make sure by the time the car comes it’s there, hopefully ironed out a little bit.

“And when you’re racing everything’s really in the present. What’s the next race? What do I need to do for the next race? All the focus is on that next race. You don’t have the mental space or the capacity to think about the future because it’s not in your interest. There is no reason to think about it. So that’s... that’s really the difference.

"This year, a lot of the stuff I talk about in the debriefs, focusing over the weekend, is actually more about the next year’s car" Alex Albon

“When we did our contract, it wasn’t just a short-term, kind of a quick thing, it was really about, what are we going to achieve in the future as a team? And I include myself a lot in that. So we know there’s a long road ahead of us, and it’s not gonna happen overnight, or in one year.

“So my job is, especially this year, a lot of the stuff I talk about in the debriefs, focusing over the weekend, is actually more about the next year’s car. We’re already doing a lot of simulator
 work for next year’s car and making sure we’re focusing on these areas.”

And that is what Vowles wants from his driver.

“I mean, he’s a new guy in the team,” laughs Albon when asked about his relationship with his boss. “So, as the races have gone on, we’ve obviously got to know each other more and more, and I think we’re forming a strong relationship and have similar goals and areas that we think need to be improved and whatnot. Yeah, it’s a good place to be at.”

Improving the team for the future is a project Albon is fully invested in

Photo by: Andy Hone / Motorsport Images