Alexander Albon admits he was disappointed to finish eighth in qualifying for the British Grand Prix after showcasing rapid speed throughout practice.
In all three free practice sessions, Albon finished inside the top three in a surprising strong run of form for the Williams squad.
In qualifying, it was less competitive – however, the Briton was able to secure his fourth Q3 appearance of the year and set the eighth-fastest time in the session.
Albon admits that he was left somewhat disappointed despite the positive result for Williams, who has been a regular at the rear of the Formula 1 field in recent years.
“It’s been an amazing weekend but it’s funny when you finish in Q3, with P8 and you’re disappointed. We have to be realistic but it’s been great so far,” the Thai-British driver said.
“In Qualifying, the session was going quite smoothly but, as the track dried out, corner speeds picked up and track evolution came in.
“We started to get quite a bit of degradation through the lap, even front deg, so we need to go away and understand that but, by the time I got to Q3, I was struggling a little bit with those combined factors.
“We’ve been really on top of it since the start of the weekend and I got into rhythm very quickly and adapted well to the changes, so we really hit the ground running.
“I think we ended up where we expected to be but I think if you told us we’d be here at the beginning of the weekend, we wouldn’t believe you.”
Albon has scored points on two occasions this year – his best result came at the Canadian Grand Prix, where he crossed the line in seventh.
With Haas and Alfa Romeo only a handful of points ahead of it in the Constructors’ Championship, Albon is eying more points at Silverstone to gain on its rivals.
“We did a great job,” Albon said of Williams’ performance this weekend.
“I felt during the week other teams were struggling with the conditions and the wind but we weren’t from the very beginning.
“So we were one step ahead, everyone started to figure it out as the weekend went ahead.
“They caught up by qualifying. But P8 is still a great place, we can score points from there.”
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