Carlos Sainz says he has been left puzzled by one of many largest swings in efficiency of his profession from the beginning of his time at Williams to the Chinese language Grand Prix.
Williams has loved a powerful begin to 2025, with Alex Albon scoring a fifth and a seventh within the opening two rounds, serving to the staff match its 2024 factors complete already. Sainz, nevertheless, was unable to match his teammate in Shanghai, and regardless of being promoted to tenth by post-race disqualifications he says he has no thought of the place his efficiency has gone after being so comfy throughout pre-season.
“We obtained it proper with the technique, sadly with the tempo of the automobile, we have been simply not there,” Sainz stated. “Struggling quite a bit with the entrance tires, once more. A whole lot of gasoline saving throughout the entire race, which clearly weren’t serving to the fronts, and we simply didn’t appear to have the tempo.
“A bit puzzled, to be sincere. Not comfortable, as a result of ever since I jumped on this automobile, I’ve been very fast in testing, however I don’t know the place all that tempo has gone for this weekend. At the least we have now now ten days to research what went improper and put collectively a plan to return again stronger in Japan.”
Sainz says he felt he had the tempo to be on phrases with Albon and get near the automobile’s potential ever since he moved to Williams, however since crashing out early of the opening race he has struggled.
“It is among the strangest swings of efficiency that I’ve had in my profession, going from naturally and super-quick in Bahrain and Abu Dhabi, even at the start of Australia, after which all of the sudden the tempo simply appeared to fall away from me.
“We did lots of setup adjustments that on my facet of the storage, adopted actually what Alex did, [both cars] have been fairly related. On his facet, it appeared to reply properly to a entrance graining, and he was quite a bit stronger. On my facet, it didn’t appear to assist a lot, and I stayed fighting the graining.”
Regardless of reviews in Spain that Sainz was working an older specification of chassis in comparison with Albon, RACER understands each drivers have the newest monocoque from Williams, with the staff having modified final yr’s design for this season.
Because of this, Williams additionally has a spare chassis, not like this time final season, and so Sainz can have the choice to make use of a special chassis to the one he raced in Shanghai on the subsequent spherical in Suzuka ought to he want.
