EXCLUSIVE: Alex Albon “enjoying the challenge” of taking Williams to the top

Alex Albon has insisted he’s “enjoying the challenge” of taking Williams back to the top of F1.

Williams endured a trickier 2024 F1 campaign, slipping back to ninth in the constructors’ championship.

While on balance, Williams were firmly in the midfield at the majority of the races, the 2024 challenger lacked the peakiness of its predecessor.

Williams were also hampered by a number of major shunts throughout the season, resulting in a lack of spare parts - or reverting to older spec upgrades.

Still, the future remains bright for Williams and Albon under James Vowles’ leadership.

2025 will see the arrival of Carlos Sainz from Ferrari, while Vowles has previously outlined Williams’ ambition to propel themselves up the order for the new regulations.

For Albon, his stock has risen since leaving Red Bull at the end of 2020.

He dismantled Nicholas Latifi in George Russell-like fashion and Logan Sargeant wasn’t a threat during his time with the team.

However, the arrival of Franco Colapinto posed more questions of Albon, crucially ahead of Sainz's arrival.

The Thai driver is a key cog in the Williams machine and that’s a challenge he’s continues to relish.

Speaking exclusively to Crash.net earlier this year, Albon - who attracted interest from the likes of Ferrari and Red Bull - dismissed the notion he’s frustrated by Williams’ competitiveness and vowed to leave “any stone unturned”.

“I see it more as if I believe in this project and for me to commit so many years to the team is a commitment,” Albon said.

“It’s part of my duty as well to make it work. I feel like I am enjoying the challenge. I feel like we have a big journey ahead of us. If I am thinking of it more like the team is not doing what I can do and all that kind of thing, I think it’s the wrong mindset.

“In the end it should be more what is my role in this and I won’t leave any stone unturned to try and get every little percentage of performance out of the car and make sure we’re on this journey.”

Results-wise, 2024 has been a step back for Williams.

In 2023, they secured seventh in the constructors’ championship - their best finish in six years.

However, part of the reason for their decline in overall results has been a deliberate shift in making the Williams car perform across a variety of circuit types, not just low downforce ones like Silverstone and Monza.

Albon believes the pain of this change will reward the team long term.

“It’s true. We know that as a team if we want to be at the best of our level, it’s no good having a peaky car,” he added. “A peaky car is good in the back field when you’re able to score on two or three races.

“That’s normally enough to get P8 or P9 over P10 in the championship. We know we need to be more consistent and adaptable on different circuits. We’ve definitely taken a step down in terms of straight-line speed compared to our rivals but I also think a lot of the teams have come towards us.

“It’s all coming into the middle. Right now in Formula 1, all 10 teams driver-wise are very similar which will be quite interesting.”