Sargeant To Race In Albon's Repaired Chassis During Japanese Grand Prix Weekend

Friday, 05 April 2024 at 00:00

Williams Racing driver Logan Sargeant explained his team's decision to give him his teammate Alex Albon's broken and repaired chassis.

Williams made a bet that few teams in F1 history managed (or even tried) to pull off. The British team started the first three races of the season without a spare chassis.

What are the risks? The 2024 Australian Grand Prix revealed the downside of this bet. When Alex Albon crashed his car and damaged the chassis beyond repair, Williams had to participate in the race with only one car.

As it turns out, the team doesn't have a spare chassis even for the Japanese Grand Prix, which means Logan Sargeant will have to drive with the damaged chassis that has been supposedly repaired by Williams in the meantime. As reported by crash.net, he said:

"It's the repaired one, just because the workload to switch the cars back over would just be far too much for the mechanics."

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"The chassis repair went better than expected. I believe it's only 100 grams heavier. So pretty much nothing."

Having said so, the American driver indicated that running a car with the repaired chassis shouldn't cost him too much additional lap time.

As you might have heard, Williams also made a very controversial decision during the Australian Grand Prix when, instead of letting Sargeant race with his car, they ordered him to give his undamaged chassis to Albon and sit the rest of the weekend. The 23-year-old reflected on the incident, saying:

"I think you always have to look at what's best for the team. Of course, as the driver, you want to drive, but at the same time, I know everyone's working as hard as they can."

"I don't blame anyone. I know everyone's trying their best, and I make mistakes, the team makes mistakes, but we move on."

Strangely enough, the American driver now suggested he felt better after everything that happened. He added he is ready to show it during qualifying in Japan.

"I think the funny part is probably psychologically feel better. After having a week away, you see things from a different perspective."

"Like I said, I've had a decent start to the year, it hasn't shown up in quali yet. I think it would have in Melbourne. So I'm just continuing with that mindset that I'm close to where I need to be, it's going to start this weekend."