The plight of Williams is a concern for everyone in Formula 1, a fan or not it is unacceptable to see the team struggling and way off the pace during the past two days of the Australian Grand Prix weekend, culminating with an embarrassing qualifying session.
It is painful to watch brave Robert Kubica and rookie George Russell toil in a car that is simply not up for Formula 1, not since the HRT days has a team been so far off the pace - but this is the great Williams Racing we are talking about.
Rookie Russell relished his first Saturday as an F1 driver and extracted all he could from the woeful package, while on his comeback day Kubica tried hard but his effort thwarted when he clipped the wall and subsequent puncture ruined his lap.
Williams qualifying report from Melbourne:
Qualifying Notes:
- George Russell qualified 19th and Robert Kubica 20th for the Australian Grand Prix
- George set a time of 1:24.360 on his third and final flying lap of Q1 to finish P19
- Robert improved on his second flying lap to a 1:26.067 but a puncture on his last effort meant that he was unable to progress, finishing the session in P20
Dave Robson, Senior Race Engineer: "We got through some good work last night building on the experiments we did yesterday. FP3 was good, with both drivers were reasonably happy with the car towards the end of that session. Going into qualifying the pace of the car was where we expected it to be, but nonetheless we did a good job getting everything out of it."
"George was pretty happy with the car throughout qualifying and made the most of what we had, steadily building up throughout Q1. It was an extremely good qualifying for his Formula One debut. Robert’s run plan was also to complete three runs in Q1, but was a real shame that he had a puncture on his final lap which meant we couldn’t get to see his ultimate time."
"He was a good step up when he got the problem, I have every reason to think that he would have been very close to George come the end. Overall a good day operationally for us considering the pace of the car, as we got everything that we could out of it. We are ready to build on that tomorrow and see whether some luck comes our way.
George Russell: "It felt like a really good lap, driving round a mega track at full beans. I got in three tidy laps and I am happy with my own performance but obviously, we are a team and we want to push for more. The guys around me, the engineers, and myself, we did a really great job to get everything out of the package we’ve got. All I can do is drive as fast as I can, and I felt like I did that."
Robert Kubica: "It wasn’t the best start of the season especially because I am last on the grid. I made a mistake on the last run when I had a good feeling and could drive the car better. I apologise for that, but that is how it is. It has been a difficult situation, but I am back on the Formula 1 grid and I would like to thank everyone that has made it possible, as well as the team."
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