“Now he’s ready” – Claire Williams

Claire Williams, Williams’ deputy team principle has said that Robert Kubica’s willingness to take the reserve role for 2018 played a big part in deciding promotion for the full-time seat for 2019.

Sergey Sirotkin had been testing alongside Kubica last year in Abu Dhabi for Williams, with the team deciding to give the drive alongside Lance Stroll to the Russian rather than the Pole.

"One of the things that impresses me most about Robert is the fact we didn’t give him the race seat for this year, yet he still took on the role of reserve driver and I think that says a lot about his personality,” Williams said (f1today.net).

Kubica accepted the offer of reserve driver and has been in the car a number of times throughout the year in practice sessions and testing whilst working with the team.

 “Now he’s absolutely ready. We undertook that evaluation process and he came out on top of the pile, and for us next year, it was always a question of making sure we secured the best talent rather than any other factors.”

“Robert has played an instrumental part into the development of the FW41 and he is going to be a big part of helping us develop the FW42 and beyond that.”

The Williams team have struggled more so this year than the previous and finished bottom of the constructor’s championship on seven points, having finished fifth the two previous years. They will be looking to sort out their problems and aim higher with their ne drivers George Russell and Robert Kubica.