(Motorsport-Total.com) – For Williams team principal James Vowles, Alexander Alban’s seventh-place performance at Monza was more impressive than Thai’s seventh-place finish at the Formula 1 race in Canada.
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After crossing the finish line in Italy, Volz radioed Alban, who “took it easy”, while his race engineer said it was the best race he had ever driven for the team.
On both occasions, Alban defended himself bravely, taking advantage of the FW45’s good speed in the Straits. However, Vowles insists it was easier at Montreal than at Monza, where the man at the front is more vulnerable.
Nevertheless, Alphonse managed to stay ahead of the faster cars for several laps. “I think there’s really only one tipping point in Montreal,” Volz told the English-language edition. Motorsport.com. “If you get the right exit out there and do the right things, you can prevent it.”
Alban “had everything under control”
“There are three or four places at Monza where you can lose a position very easily. You actually saw Alex lose his position but he immediately got back into overtaking position,” Vowles said.
“So he had everything under control and the result was satisfactory with seventh place. It would have been easy to lose positions one and three, but that didn’t happen to him.”
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In Canada, however, Williams was fortunate that Esteban Ocon was driving with a damaged rear wing. “Here we had Lando, who was three-tenths behind at times approaching Turn 1. But Alex was ahead at the end.”
The omens were good for Williams at Monza and Volz admitted he was relieved that Alban had turned expectations into a good result after finishing eighth at the Dutch Grand Prix the previous weekend.
Different venues at Zandvoort and Monza
“The fight for seventh place in the championship is a question of points,” he says. “And we’re not stupid, one race is enough to undo our hard work. For me at Zandvoort, it was about making sure we could score points on other tracks, especially with a lot of downforce.”
“Here it was more about whether we could handle the expectations that weighed on our shoulders, meaning we could finish in the points with the car we had, and whether we could meet those expectations.”
According to Volls, it worked: “I think the car could have been in better conditions in seventh place,” he says. “As you saw, I would even say that the car was a little bit worse, but we are happy with what we achieved.”
Vowles says 21 points after two-thirds of the season is a “dream” for Grove: “Yes, of course,” he replied when asked if it was better than expected. “It would have been rude to throw away the fact that we’ve been bottom of the Championship with two points for so many years. To be where we are now is a dream.”
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