Williams has officially claimed P5 in the 2025 Formula 1 Constructors’ Championship, with Carlos Sainz and Alex Albon reflecting on a standout season ahead of the F1 Abu Dhabi GP.
Sainz credits the FW47
Nearing the end of his first year with Williams, Sainz highlighted in his print media session the team’s progress and the two unexpected podiums that exceeded his expectations heading into the year. He sits P9 in the Drivers’ Championship before the final round of 2025.
“Yeah, I mean you always have high expectations, but for sure the expectations were something that I really tried to control before coming into this year, knowing that there was going to be obviously a reset in my results and what was possibly achievable in my first year in Williams.
“But like I said, after the race, if you would have told me before the year when I signed my Williams contract in August 24 that there was going to be a couple of podiums, a sprint podium and this upward trend, I would have definitely taken it,” he said, having claimed P3 in Baku, the Austin Sprint, and recently in Qatar.
“First of all, credit to Williams because they designed a car during 24 for 25 that was already a big step forward in terms of what the car could do from the first race and the first test was a massive step forward to the car of 24 and that is only great for them because there I can have very little influence. And then very good development through the year. We only brought one small upgrade during the year, but even if the upgrade was small and it was effective, as a team we still managed to develop the car with set-up, with understanding, with getting to know each other and together with Alex, I think we followed the right direction.”
Albon: “Best season yet”
Having joined Williams in 2022, Alex Albon praised the team for the major improvements after previously finishing 9th, 7th, and 10th in the Constructors’ standings.
“Yes, I would say my best season yet,” he shared, currently placing P8 in the Drivers’ Championship. Albon has scored points in 11 races this season, with a best finish of P5, compared to only four points finished during the 2024 F1 season.
“In many ways, I feel like, obviously the car, I think, takes credit for most of that. I feel like I’ve said it before, but I haven’t changed so much my application into this year, but the car and what the guys and girls have done at the factory have made a huge step this year. I’ve been with this team for four years now and this has been clearly the biggest step out of the four years, from year to year. It’s been enjoyable, it’s been fun to be able to race against some of the top teams in some certain tracks.”
Challenges and podium hopes
However, since Monza, Albon has struggled to score points and suffered an unfortunate DNF in Las Vegas due to early damage and radio issues.
Reflecting on these results, he said: “As you said, towards the end of the year, not ideal, but generally the pace has been strong, just either myself, I made a couple of mistakes in Vegas and Baku, kind of stand out to me, but then the other ones have just been not going my way, just kind of what it was like for Carlos at the beginning of the year. And that’s it, really.
“I would say I’m just very proud of the team, because I feel like each year we’ve been making steps forward, but it just seems to be that things are starting to click now and as a team, as a unit, we seem to be dialling in, and I’ve said it before, but the gap from P10 to P5 is smaller than the gap to P5 to P1, or not even P5 to P1, P5 to P4. So we know that we’ve still got a long road ahead of us, but I’m hoping my podium chances come a little bit sooner rather than later,” he concluded, looking ahead to the 2025 F1 season finale in Abu Dhabi.
