2023 Belgian Grand Prix - F1 Sprint

Dave Robson, Head of Vehicle Performance: Another day of very mixed weather. We were better today on the Inters at low fuel but in the drying conditions they didn’t last very long so we opted to go for a single timed lap at the end of the 2nd part of the Shootout but were unable to set a laptime when the session ended early following the red flag. It would have been good to try the car on a slick tyre in the final part of the Sprint Shootout but otherwise it was a good session.

The Sprint race was difficult as the track dried rapidly, which increased the degradation on the Intermediates. There wasn’t enough time to move to the slick tyres and make up for the pit stop. Therefore, the drivers had to manage the Inters to the end of the race.

It was a difficult day but provided some good learning ahead of the Grand Prix tomorrow.

Alex Albon: That was really tough. We’ve been struggling all weekend in this greasy weather, where we just can’t seem to get on top of it. We got some understanding of it during the Sprint Shootout; however, we were just putting new tyres on the car. As soon as we did more than 9 corners, the tyres were overheating. It’s good to go through these periods where it becomes clear to us that we’re weak in these conditions, and it’s obvious when you see the tyres overheating quickly. With a lower downforce set up, it normally works around here, however you don’t see the benefit of the straights when you’re sliding through corners with the heat building and the tyres continuously overheating. If the race can stay dry tomorrow, we’ll be in a good place.

Logan Sargeant: A difficult Sprint race out there and in those drying conditions the tyres were really struggling to hang on. All in all, considering I was the second Williams car to pit, I extracted the maximum from our situation today. I could’ve potentially had a slightly better Q2 by finishing that lap. Hopefully if it’s dry conditions tomorrow it should suit our car better and we should have an opportunity to move forward.