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Last year, driving the slowest car on the grid, in his first season with Williams after a year out of Formula 1, Alexander Albon was easily the most outstanding driver towards the back end of the field.
Heading into year two with new confidence, a new team principal and a fast new car, Albon looked to lead his lowly team from the bottom of the standings at long last.
He did just that. Almost single-handedly, in fact.
Albon’s 2022 season had been defined by him sniping crucial points on the rare occasions the opportunities presented themselves. But in 2023, Williams’ FW45 was a much more capable car than its predecessor and with the field so close together through the season, that gave Albon many more chances to compete for points over the year.
He happily took them, securing seven top ten finishes over the season and missing out in 11th three further times. That rewarded him with a total of 27 points by the end of the year, giving Williams their best constructors’ championship finish since 2017 in seventh and putting him 13th in the drivers’ standings – ahead of Yuki Tsunoda and behind the two Alpine drivers to effectively earn the crown of ‘king of the lower-midfield’.
What stood out most about Albon was not just that he took points, but how. From as early as the opening round in Bahrain, he demonstrated a near-unflappable ability to absorb pressure from rivals over endless laps. He held off Pierre Gasly through the middle phase of the race in Sakhir before fending off Tsunoda in the closing laps to kick off 2023 with a point for tenth place. He took another top ten finish in the Baku sprint race with ninth place, missing out on a second point due to the sprint race points system.
But Albon’s most memorable giant-killing performance of the year came in Canada, where he exploited the strengths of his Williams to reach Q3 and then brilliantly executed a bold one-stop strategy to first keep George Russell’s Mercedes, then Esteban Ocon’s Alpine behind him despite them having DRS for 24 of the final 25 laps of the grand prix to record his best ever finish for Williams in seventh. There were perhaps greater heroics in Silverstone the following month when he beat both Ferraris home to the chequered flag by holding off Charles Leclerc with very smart use of his ERS battery to score four more points at his team’s home race.
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Russell rose from 16th on the grid to 11th, just outside the points, in Hungary, this time after keeping Valtteri Bottas behind him for 20 laps at a Hungaroring circuit that was not supposed to suit the Williams. Zandvoort was not a good fit for the FW45 either, in theory, yet he somehow managed to stick the car on the second row for his best qualifying result in a Williams. He dropped all the way down to 15th by gambling on slicks on a wet track in the race but managed to rise all the way back up to eighth by the finish for another unexpected haul of points.
Monza was always the one weekend of the year that Albon would have had circled on his calendar as a track that could not have been better suited to his car. He was inside the top ten in every session, qualified sixth ahead of both McLarens and Lewis Hamilton and then refused to allow Norris to get an opportunity to get by for 17 straight laps to equal his seventh place finish from Canada and boost Williams’ hopes of taking seventh in the championship in a major way. He could have added another point in Singapore until he was shoved into the wall in a desperate move from Sergio Perez late in the race, denying him the opportunity to fight for the last point to the finish.
More points followed with another strong sprint race performance in Qatar, before he received an unexpected ninth place classification in Austin following two disqualifications after the race for rivals ahead. His final points of the season came in Mexico, though it was hard for Albon not to rue what might have been after his early weekend pace had looked exceptional. But while his car’s unexpected change between final practice and qualifying left him much further down the grid than he had hoped to be, he still managed his tyres well in the race to move into ninth by the finish.
But while Albon’s season had plenty of moments to be proud of, he still showed room for improvement. He appeared to be in contention for a very strong result in Australia before he threw it all away by crashing out in the early laps with an error that was later blamed on a spike in tyre temperatures caused by running wide at the previous corner. He also wrecked his car’s new rear wing in Monaco by crashing in first practice and slid off track in the race when the rain came, then was eliminated from Q1 the next weekend in Spain after sliding off track.
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Alexander Albon
BestWorstGP start418GP finish7 (x2)16Points27
However, the biggest problem with Albon’s season was his chronic addiction to exceeding track limits. While so many of the field had their troubles with staying within the lines out on track through the year, perhaps none so like Albon. From losing multiple best qualifying laps – including a painful onr in Mexico – he received time penalties during races at the Red Bull Ring, Losail and the Circuit of the Americas and black-and-white warning flags in some others. As hard as Albon clearly pushes to put his car in a position to succeed, he must do a better job of keeping on track next season.
At the end of the year, Albon had not just succeeded in securing seventh for Williams, he had decimated rookie team mate Logan Sargeant in the process – including a complete shutout in the qualifying battle. But as Sargeant proved to be in need of considerable improvement over his rookie season, it’s an achievement that rings rather hollow.
Albon’s 2023 campaign outshone many who had raced in much faster cars throughout the year. Whether Williams can take another step forward next season remains to be seen, but at least they know they have a driver who will deliver for them if they give him the car to do so.
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