'Not so crazy Leclerc' disrupted Albon's P3 'dream' at strong Imola outing

22:07, 18 May

byNorberto Mujica

Alexander Albon's strong P4 at the Imola Grand Prix was a product of the Williams FW47's pace as well as the team's strategic calls, which could have been P3, had the Thai played things a bit more patiently, he himself acknowledges.

In the last few laps of the race at Imola, Albon was in contention for P4 with Ferrari driver Charles Leclerc, whom on old tyres fought to retain his position with tooth and nail, something the Thai completely understands.

"I do think each way you look at it, P4 was in it today. If the safety car didn't come out at the end that was a P4. If you take the Charles' incident that was also a P4."

"I'm not going to say I'm disappointed with P5. And honestly when I look at the battle with Charles, I would have done the same in his position. I don't think he did anything that crazy."

"It's just someone trying to hold their position and obviously [I] just lost out to Lewis. Just thinking about it, [I've] got to be better, being a bit more patient with Charles and see if I can get him a little bit later," added Albon.

'P3 might have been in the cards' due to William's strong raw pace

As Albon hunted down Leclerc, he also set his sights on McLaren's Oscar Piastri for P3.

"But at that point in the race, honestly, I was feeling so good, I thought 'Oscar's up ahead on warm tyres, I can go after him and maybe get a P3'. So yeah, still very happy with the race."

Said dreams, though derailed after the incident with Leclerc at Tamburello, are proof of William's strong raw pace and its low tyre degradation which opened up the strategic options at Williams.

"Even in pure pace, we were running P4-P5 today day. So we were able to extend the first stint very strongly and that kind of set us up for the whole race."

"The VSC obviously played in our favour, but at the same time, everyone else was pretty much stuck in the two-stop. We were pretty comfortable in the one-stop, so we were looking really good."

Albon added 10 points to Williams' tally in the Constructors' championship confirming the upward trend observed since Bahrain.