Alex Albon stated that if he wouldn’t have learned less ahead of this weekend’s Formula 1 Singapore Grand Prix if he’d “stayed at home” on Friday, after truncated running, including a fiery early exit from FP1.
The Anglo-Thai driver was forced to abort his running early in the opening session, after a rear brake issue caused billowing smoke from the back of his FW47.
Williams mechanics worked hard in the Southeast Asian heat to repair the issue, and Albon was able to partake in FP2.
But a multitude of incidents, which prompted two red flags, saw staggered running for all the drivers, which left Albon at a loss when it came to finding any idea on strategy come raceday.
“One of the worst Fridays of the year for sure,” he told Sky Sports F1 after FP2.
“So lots of red flags, lots of yellow flags, so I never really did a lot. I feel like if I stayed at home today and arrived tomorrow, I’d be none the wiser. So we’ll see what we have, but, that’s it.”
Albon went on to rue the track time he missed, explaining how the inherent characteristics of the Marina Bay Circuit mean that he has most probably compromised his entire weekend owing to a “disjointed” Friday.
“Because this track is so peaky and the tyres have such a small window, you basically, unless you hit them on the first lap, the subsequent laps… it’s not useless, but you’re basically not learning anything,” he surmised.
“If anything you lose confidence because the grip drops off and you keep trying to, to learn the circuit. So that’s why it’s so important to get laps around here.
“Um, which was, yeah, it was very disjointed, but we’ll, we’ll try and learn from the other car.”
Sainz hails encouraging Friday running at Singapore
While Albon struggled for any consistent running and performance, his team-mate Carlos Sainz, on the other hand, was completely on the opposite end of the spectrum in terms of his feedback.
The Spaniard finished P8 during both practice sessions but revealed the team’s call on set-up during the second practice session has left him wanting more — or maybe less.
“The two sessions being always within the top eight, top six cars, which is encouraging to start the weekend,” he began.
“Unfortunately for FP2, we went in a set of direction that I didn’t really like. So, you know, uh, maybe to revert and have something more like a FP1, which was giving me a bit more confidence.
“And then our usual challenges on the soft tyre again, appeared a bit very competitive on mediums, but as soon as we switched to softs, we were starting to struggle. So those two things mainly will be a homework tonight.”
Unlike his team-mate, Sainz was not too concerned about the interruptions that impeded track running during the second session.
“To be honest, here is always you bias everything towards qualifying. As you know, it’s usually a one-stop, easy one-stop race and just qualifying position is everything,” asserted Sainz.
“So not too concerned about that. It’s more getting to a rhythm and making sure we do the right setup changes, both on setup and on tyres.”
READ MORE — Oscar Piastri tops incident-filled FP2 for F1 Singapore GP
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