Albon makes ‘weird’ discovery as Williams leave notorious era behind

Alex Albon claims he feels 'calm' and "reassured" that Williams "is on the right track" after emerging from an era of car build that earned the team notoriety.

It was 10 months ago, and just over a year into his tenure as team principal, that James Vowles laid bare the inadequacies of the team's car design processes, notably that an Excel spreadsheet was being used to source and track components.

For a team of Williams' stature, Vowles described it as "a joke", with the Excel list "impossible to navigate and update".

Mercifully, the system has since been radically overhauled, erasing any concerns Albon once felt at the start of his time with the team.

Vowles has implemented remarkable change during his two years at the helm in an attempt to propel Williams back up the grid, although it slipped backwards last year, from seventh in the constructors' championship in 2023 to ninth.

Hailing "the work done at the factory" and the "huge changes", Albon heads into this season at least knowing the team is in a far better place than it has been for a considerable period.

"When you think about how the car is being built and the whole famous thing around it being on an Excel sheet, and whatnot, that's all gone away," said Albon, speaking to RacingNews365.

"We're far more current and up-to-date than we were before. There is a learning process in that, and we are still learning. It's still only been 12 months since we changed all the systems around the team.

"So in many ways, I have calmness, weirdly, to know that the things done were not perfect, and if we'd maybe stayed to our old ways, we'd have been okay.

"But to know that everything's going in the right direction for the future gives me some calmness and that reassurance that we're on the right track."

Williams car DNA change a plus

Last year's FW46 was at least an improvement on its predecessor, even if the results did not show that to be the case.

Several high-profile accidents throughout the season also did not help the team's cause, but Albon could at least feel the progress made beneath him.

"Conceptually, we did a good job with changing the DNA of the car," said Albon.

"Realistically, I know our car [in 2023] was quite peaky, and we had great performances, and then very bad performances.

"The car [in 2024] was very average in the speed traps, but at least we were not amazing at one track and then bad at another. We were consistently average, unfortunately, in many ways, but that's what you've got to be.

"You can't be a top midfield team, or you can't be aspiring to be a top team and have these swings. You need to be well-rounded, and I think we have become more well-rounded, so that's a positive.

"We focused a lot on low-speed balance. Monaco, Mexico, even low speed in Qatar, Turn 6, Turn 7, we were competitive.

"I don't think it's that we overdid it, but directionally, we targeted something and we achieved it, so that's a good thing.

"It's not like we've focused on an area of the car to fix and we weren't able to achieve it, so that's also a positive."