Alexander Albon said his fourth season in Formula 1 was his best yet, after single-handedly scoring enough points to earn Williams seventh place in the constructors’ standings.
In his second season at the team, Albon scored 27 of their 28 points. That was enough to keep them ahead of main rivals AlphaTauri, who fell short of overhauling them in the final race of the year despite a strong end to the season.
Albon joined Williams last year, after being demoted from a race seat to a reserve driver role by Red Bull the year before. In his comeback season he scored just four points. This year he scored more than six times as many, despite Williams ending the development of their FW45 car early on to focus on their 2024 design.
“I’m very proud of my performance,” said Albon of his 2023 efforts. “I’m not the most arrogant person, I would say, but I will give myself credit.
“I feel like I’ve had a very strong season. I felt like most of my races haven’t been simple. There’s been races where we’ve been fighting, fighting, fighting the whole time. But I enjoy it.
“That’s the environment that I thrive in. For me it’s been my strongest year in F1 and that connection that I have with the team has really helped that. I feel like that’s where we’ve been able to execute everything, all the races we’ve done so well in.”
Albon’s points haul resulted in Williams’ highest placing in the constructors’ championship since 2017, when the team was a far more regular points threat, only failing to score three times across a 20-race campaign.
A more competitive car would improve Williams’ chances of making the points in more races now, and Albon says it is the team’s execution of race weekends that has been enabling it to beat rivals when the potential has been there to score.
“Our car does have its moments, and one of our biggest focuses next year is to stop these weaknesses in our car,” he said. “But the execution has been very strong, I think, and we’ve made the most of our opportunities. So that’s why I believe we’ve been able to actually get P7.
“When we’ve had the car to do it, we’ve made sure we score the points. I think others have either had a blunder with strategy, or whatever it may have been, just to miss out on points.”
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2023 Abu Dhabi Grand Prix
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