Lance Stroll insists he is still enjoying Formula 1 in 2018, in the face of Williams’ strife in the championship.
Stroll was equipped with a Williams car good enough for fifth in the Constructors’ Championship last year but this season the team has slumped to the rear of the pack.
Stroll took Williams’ sole points to date courtesy of an eighth-placed finish in Azerbaijan and insists life as a backmarker still provides motivation and opportunity to improve.
“The nature of the sport is good,” he said. “There’s good cars, there’s bad cars.
“It changes year by year. As a driver, you always have to try and extract the most out of what is available to you.
“I’m still very young. This is part of the process of being in Formula 1. Last year I was fortunate enough to experience standing on the podium, start on the front row. I had a lot of races where I was in the points. That was great.
“This year, it’s a bit of a challenge. We’re in a different position. That’s adversity you face in motorsport sometimes. You just have to overcome it and look at the bigger picture.
“We’re in the situation we’re in. I’m still getting in the car every day and challenging myself. Even in other things, even though the qualy positions aren’t great, I look at some of my starts this year and stuff, I enjoy that.
“It’s an opportunity to make up for some of the difficult qualifying sessions we’ve experienced as a team this year. It’s things like that.
“That can then lead to a good race with a lot of carnage and stuff, so you never know in racing. You always have to keep your head down and get ready to capitalise on any opportunity.”
Williams finished at the rear of the pack in France and while remaining as optimistic as possible, Stroll is wary that the situation is unlikely to have changed in such a short frame of time.
“I don’t want to assume that it will be a very difficult weekend before it even starts,” he said.
“Realistically though, looking at where we have been, it probably won’t be very different.
“It’s only been five days between France and now. Not much has changed, but there’s always a possibility of some rain or something happening, and can mix things up.”
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