Vowles: Spares we carry not sufficient for five major accidents

Between Alex Albon and Franco Colapinto, Williams suffered from five huge crashes over the course of two Formula 1 weekends. The Mexico City Grand Prix and the São Paulo Grand Prix.

Albon crashed in practice in Mexico after a get-together with Oliver Bearman, replacing Kevin Magnussen at Haas. Then at the start of the Grand Prix, he was taken out by VCARB's Yuki Tsunoda.

The Thai driver then went on the crash in the wet qualifying for the São Paulo Grand Prix, which meant the team did not have enough time to get his car ready for the race. He did not take part.

Colapinto also crashed in qualifying, but the team managed to fix his car only for him to crash again in the Grand Prix in extreme wet conditions behind the Safety Car.

Now, with less than two weeks until F1 gets running again in Las Vegas, Williams have an issue with the spec of car they will run in the final American race this season, as the recent crash fest for both of their drivers meant they are running short on spares.

Speaking on the Williams App, reviewing the race in Brazil, Vowles said: "There's no team on the grid that can cope with five major accidents in two race weekends. Simply the matter of spares we carry are not sufficient to carry that amount of attrition.

"Vegas, I have high hopes for," he added. "We were fast there last year, and I'm confident the car will work well in those conditions. So we will do our absolute utmost to get two cars to the best specification they can be, with sufficient spares around us to make that happen.

"What that looks like is difficult to predict. We're still getting the items back from Brazil and determining what we have to do in terms of construct and build in order to give ourselves the best possible scenario."

Williams did not score any points in Brazil, while their closest competitor in the 2024 F1 constructors' championship, Alpine, scored a double podium and points in the Sprint as well, which meant they are now ahead.

"The Brazil weekend was probably the most brutal that I can remember across my entire career," Vowles reflected. "In the space of seven days, a little more than, we had five major accidents. In Brazil alone between qualifying the race three. That's an amount that near enough no one can sustain on the grid."

However, the Briton insisted that does not wipe out all the good progress Williams have done recently under his watch; he continued: "This team is going through the process of rebuilding itself into a state where it can win races in the future. That doesn't happen overnight.

"It doesn't happen without significant change throughout an organization, and this one race is simply just a blip in what is a grand scheme of a multi-year program.

"It doesn't mean it hurts any less. It's something that hurts tremendously as I'm talking to you now," he admitted. "But I want us to be successful and performant.

"I came here not to be fighting for the odd point, but rather fighting for wins and more in the future. And that can't be achieved without some level of compromise along the way, without rebuilding an organization.

"So yes, it's painful what happened last weekend, but it hasn't changed what our destination is. In fact, it's rooted me even further more to the fact of what we have to do to achieve it is significant, but we can achieve it together as a team," Vowles concluded.

As Williams enter the final races of the season, a triple header, they are ninth in the F1 constructors' championship with 17 points. Alpine scored 35 points over the course of the weekend and jumped to sixth.