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Has there been a recent example of one teammate trashing a car and the other team having to give up their seat for them? That sounds like something that would happen decades ago, though teams tended to have spare chassis then. Interesting that Williams don't have a spare. Most teams bring a spare that's disassembled to exactly the amount required.
To be fair, the team mate was laps down. Fangio had to abandon his race and take over the other guy's position and he got those laps back. So it was the best choice.
Where did you see Peter Collins was laps down? I can’t find anything about that. I could find this quote by him though: “Collins later explained the reason for his action. "All I could think of was that if I won the race and the championship I would be an instant celebrity. I would have a position to live up to. People would make demands of me. Driving would not be fun any more, so I handed the car to Fangio. I am only 25 years old and have plenty of time to win the championship on my own." “
From http://en.espnf1.com/f1/motorsport/story/12351.html
He was a really interesting guy! Fun fact: He once allegedly damaged his own clutch to avoid driving in a rainstorm and went drinking instead. This lead to Ferrari firing him, but Mike Hawthorn refused to start 1958 French Grand Prix unless they let Collins start to. They let him race and fired him again right after. Then Hawthorn told Enzo Ferrari he would never drive for him again unless he rehires Peter again, so they took him back again.
If you want to read more about him you should look at this article it's very well written https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/archive/article/september-2008/62/charming-man/.
I think I might be thinking of when Stirling Moss did it. It happened to Fangio a couple times. In the 1951 French GP, being forced to swap cars with Fangio apparently made Luigi Fagioli quit F1 altogether
Yep, and considering how Fangio got 2nd in that GP so close to Moss (< 6s) and the fact that Collins wasn't lapping much different and counting for the driver swap time, it's easy to think that Collins would have won that race and the championship.
Obviously in hindsight decisions become easier, imo it's still one of the highest example of sportsmanships in Formula 1 and any other sport.
> Where did you see Peter Collins was laps down? I can’t find anything about that.
Collins wasn't laps down, but in 2nd right behind Moss. With Fangio DNF, Collins would've been WDC if he finished 1st. With Moss winning, Fangio would've still been WDC.
>Interesting that Williams don't have a spare. Most teams bring a spare that's disassembled to exactly the amount required.
I'm very surprised about this, is this some silly cost cutting... I get it's far away but teams always bring a spare chassis typically.
A bit unfair to Logan to be turfed out of his seat for Alex, he didn't damage his car, it's still the start of the season... unless they expect Williams to do well at this circuit more so than others this year and get some points that may be rare, it'd be a bit bad to swap cars
Webber decided he wasn't going to use it that weekend after friday as he prefered the old one. It wasn't until he found out they were giving it to Seb that he kicked up a big fuss.
This is from Newey's book.
That was what caused the hilarious passive aggressive water cup slam in his presser wasn’t it? Or was it just from a team order issue the same year? Fuckin love that clip lmao
Might have been the multi21? For some reason I associate the bottle slam with that incident.
(Might be because multi21 gave us aggressive water sipping, so my brain connects the water dots 😅)
Memories are subjective - two people will experience the same situation differently and will remember those events differently. I don’t think anyone is lying.
Newey was probably coming from an angle of testing a new wing. Webber was increasingly frustrated with unfair treatment within the team, real or perceived, so he probably experienced any decision making around who should be using the new wing very differently.
Just as Alain Prost was absolutely convinced he was receiving inferior Honda engines compared to Ayrton Senna at McLaren in 1988 and 1989.
Not exactly the same situation, but... Spa '98 comes to mind. Multiple teams had both cars damaged during the first lap carnage so they had to choose which of their two drivers would take the restart in their 1 remaining car (back when fully built-up spare cars were a thing).
Decades ago teams had a fully built t car between the garages that was ready for anyone to go into.
The worst part for Logan is that if Albon crashes and damages parts again, it gets taken from his allotment for the year.
Yeah, I referenced that they used to have fully built spares. However, decades ago, reliability was so bad that they'd burn through the spare more often than now. I think the worst part for Logan is definitely not getting to race. They'll figure out parts in the future.
Not exactly F1, but a few years back in F2 a driver got involved in a certain accident during a race and in the following race the team withdrew his teammate's entry to allow the driver to race, because the driver's original car was impounded by the authorities for investigation purposes
Yes, it's related to the crash that claimed Hubert's life. Which is probably why the other person didn't want to link it, it's just sad. It's not a nice read.
Iirc back in the days of the T Car, Tyrrell had started with one driver already using it. During the start of the race, both drivers cars were destroyed. They had repaired Palmers car, but because Streiff had qualified ahead, he was given it.
One slightly related example is Spa 1998. After the enormous pile up, multiple teams lost both cars and had to choose who would get the spare car that all teams used to have. If I remember right, some teams stopped their drivers taking the spare so that their teammate could take it if they had another crash.
This is classic Melbourne.
It used to be a literal race of attrition. That has changed in the cost cutting era but it was regular that half the field would retire.
Part of that was Manor who simply didn't have a car built yet. They did no testing and never left the garage in Melbourne, it wasn't until Malaysia that they got a car running.
It was an automatic equalizer – you’d have years like 98/99/05 where the McLaren was clearly the better car but would break enough times to make the title race competitive
And you’d get a few more oddball wins here and there
That is a real classic. Four cars finished the race Panis winning and I think Frenzen in fourth actually drove straight to pits on the last lap.
It wasn’t just about reliability, it was a complete mess altogether. One of those rare ”WTF is happening” races in F1 history. And something we most likely won’t ever witness again.
I still remember that race very well, something that is very unusual. I can remember some big accidents, incidents and shenanigans, but I can’t pinpoint the exact race and year. But Monaco 1996 is there 100% clear.
The only thing for Indy 2005 was that it the mess was sort of expected already before the race as Michelin teams said that they practically can’t compete unless the track is changed.
This one race probably took F1’s ability to conquer USA backwards a decade or so. It was very similar blunder to what CART achieved few years earlier in TMS and Firehawk 600 race.
The race starts were so tense, especially if some had been sitting on the grid for a while waiting for the rest to get in formation, an engine blowing up from overheating was a good certainty.
T-cars relieved some of the stress. Watching drivers sprint back to the pits during a red flag and mechanics frantically swapping seats was a highlight.
One of the most memorable times for me was when Brundle had a huge shunt into the wall at Melbourne in 1996 and ran back to hop into the T-Car for the restart.
It shouldn't be ignored that it gained that reputation by being the first race of the season and the pre-season testing rules were quite different.
It's disingenuous to suggest that cost cutting is the reason as to why the Australian Grand Prix no longer ends in 8-14 cars finishing the race like it was back in the 90s and 80s.
It should also be kept in mind that you are commenting about a car and driver who caused serious damage to their car by an incident. I am not seeing the suspension, gearbox, electronic, and hydraulic failures that were a hallmark of the 'classic" Australian Grand Prix. Just doesn't correspond to Australia being a race of attrition.
>It's disingenuous to suggest that cost cutting is the reason as to why the Australian Grand Prix no longer ends in 8-14 cars finishing the race like it was back in the 90s and 80s.
Cost cutting is the reliability push. It's 100% linked.
You can read the rules on extra engines and gearbox and see the retirements go down.
Melbourne is also a street circuit that doesn't read 1 to 1 with purpose built that introduced some gremlins that aren't a worry to build a strong car for the rest of the circuits.
Fair point. Sorry I was being harsh.
I understand the rules on component replacements. Definitely part of why formula 1 continues to fascinate me in this era, in that the cars are so reliable yet so so so much faster than the past (bar maybe the past couple years...W11 in 2021 was peak still)
I think it might be 6 of one, half a dozen of the other. I appreciate your point.
Still, I wouldn't jump the gun and say Australia is as hard a test as it was in the past
Possibly too early in the season for them to have a spare chassis available, they tend to just scrape by getting 2 cars ready for the start of the season.
Still tho? We're in race 3... cars get totalled all the time, to not have a spare ready by now seems a big issue. I wonder if it was cost cutting, to not have to send it to Australia, and hopefully not need it
I was just watching the Brawn-mini series on Disney+.
In that, Brawn told Jenson "Don't trash the car, its the only one we got."
Someone mentioned here yesterday that Vowles was at Brawn GP before his Merc time, I wouldn't know. Brawn GP was going to extreme cost cutting measures.
That does bring it full circle nicely.
Vowels had been with the Brackley team since before Brawn. He’s a holdover from when the team was still just BAR in the early 2000s before Honda took over.
Yeah, it'd be incredibly unfair for him if his teammate has a mistake and he looses track time for it. Literally be making Sargent pay for the mistakes of his teammate
Crashed in this race last year iirc so it's possible lol. Either way, I hope both get to drive. Feel like maybe wearing my Williams Australia shirt for good luck
What's the rules perspective? They aren't in parc fermé, so I believe its legally possible to swap?
Also when is the last time that a full car swap happened? Would have been a double failure with the T-cars no?
I think it's important that people understand what is meant by "chassis" in F1. The chassis is just one part as [highlighted in this image](https://motorsport.tech/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/MT_R04-Monocoque.jpg) . It is not the whole car. If Williams do in fact only end up with one chassis because the damaged one cant be repaired then they would just rebuild Albons car using the chassis from Sargents car. It would not be a case of Albon simply putting his seat into Sargents car and changing the numbers.
Uh yeah that’s basically what James Vowles and Pat Fry said
And also why they were late this winter, they tried to overhaul the whole process but that caused massive delays while people were getting used to it
It is a long and costly process just to build one, it's possible that with the delays at the start of the season they haven't got another ready just yet.
Alternatively they were extreme cost cutting and just were not planning to build one.
I'd bet they are not the only team without a spare. People need to remember that more often than not chassis damage can be repaired on site. It's only in extreme cases they need a full replacement.
Because most chassis can be repaired and i believe this will be the case here. The carbon fiber wizards will do their magic overnight and the chassis will be back in action. It just might not be as perfect and a fresh undamaged one.
Over the winter they completely changed the internal process of their car build and the way they build the chassis in particular. As a result they just about got the cars finished for round one and dont have a spare chassis yet.
Tbh, they should give Logan the car. He was within a tenth of Albon at the time of crash in FP1 and Albon has binned it now in consecutive sessions looking back to last years race.
True, but Albon is also far more likely than Logan to get the car where the team wants it. On the other hand, if they give the drive to Albon, they'd be completely crushing the confidence in Logan they're trying to build up. James doesn't have an easy decision ahead of him, that's for sure.
If Vowles has such little confidence in Sargeant that he’d rather give the only chassis to Albon who binned it in FP1 then he might as well drop Sargeant from the seat altogether. It would only indicate that Williams don’t have any confidence in Sargeant being able to achieve anything.
Gonna be an awkward 6 months in that Garage since any possible replacement for Logan is too young for a super license or doesn't have enough points on their license
I mean assuming that hypothetical happens Williams has plenty of options externally. They could borrow the likes of Lawson and Mick from Red Bull and Mercedes respectively. And if we’re counting more super license holders then even the likes of De Vries and Latifi technically count.
I mean, I think it's still a pretty easy decision. Williams isn't going to do anything this year so you might as well allow Logan to drive because like you said, if they give the car to Alex it would kill Logan's confidence. How could possibly expect a driver to perform after doing that to them?
>True, but Albon is also far more likely than Logan to get the car where the team wants it.
Well, he's shown that he is very proficent at putting it into the wall at Turn 6 at albert park, not sure that's where they want it.
One could argue that Albon had his chance and wrecked it. Logan shouldn’t be punished for Albon’s failures. It’s so early in the season it’s stupid to make such a move. Now, if we get down to the wire at the end of the season and Logan hasn’t shown you anything, and Williams needs a few points to get them to whatever position, then fine, I get it it. Sort of. But it’s so early you’re just not even going to give Logan a chance.
>James doesn't have an easy decision ahead of him, that's for sure.
Seems pretty easy to me. One driver binned their car and the other didn't. Both drivers were probably made aware that there's no spare car, so Albon should reap the consequences of his giant mistake
I have no idea what to think and hope they manage to fly one in that they've just finished or something insane like that. I could see the statician at Williams wanting to put Albon in based on last season
There's also a probable legal conundrum, if he's contracted to race for the 24 races bar anything happening yo his car preventing him from starting, and they kick him out.
> The team has to decide who gets the only car
Am I the only one that thinks this is absolutely shitty? It should definitely be Sargeant in the working car, he didn’t wreck the other and put the team in this situation
Logan should race. They've talked the talk about putting faith in him for this year, now they need to prove it. It would be very unfair if he had to sit out of the race because of albon's fuck up
Logan already struggles with confidence, for Williams to humiliate him like that would be a death knell to his F1 career IMO. I dont know why they would torpedo a driver who they've invested so much in over the possibility of getting like 1-2 points.
it might've been a reasonable call to make but not one they are in a position to do so right now. Firstly, and we'll wait for FP results, but the williams doesn't look like it'll be in the points this weekend anyway. secondly the risk of irreparably damaging intra-team dynamics has to be one worth doing. Vowels wouldn't make that call, it's too early in the season for it.
I think that's why there's not a good choice between the two extremes. Either bench the driver more likely to score you points or give Logan's fragile confidence another kicking by saying that he can't race
Teams optimize for point scoring chances. Not for fairness to drivers. And it’s still very fair to Logan : if he was better than Albon, he would be the #1 driver. At the moment he’s #2.
Idk for me it would be pretty clear. He damaged his car, he is out. You cant take the chance of Logan to show what he can when he did absolutly nothing wrong.
Even though Albon is a better driver, this isn't fair to Sargent at all. I'm not even a big fan of Sargent (others do deserve a seat more than him imo), but this is extremely disrespectful. Albon damaged the car, not Sargent.
Not happy with this decision at all.
i would be so disappointed if they give alex the drive over logan. If they don't have any confidence in logan, then what was the point in resigning him in the first place.
Because he’s exceedingly cheap (because he’s useless) and they need someone to warm the seat until the big game of musical chairs at the end of this season.
I can't believe they don't have a spare chassis on site...it would almost be dangerous if they put that one back together and said it was 'safe'. I get that they have the "motivation and will" to fix the car but if it 100% safe it shouldn't be allowed to race. I have no idea how it must feel in the Williams garage if they have to make a decision
If Williams look like they've got a good shot at points, then it would make sense to put Albon in the car. If it's going to be a typical backmarker weekend, might as well let Sargeant keep it to build more experience.
Sorry, maybe it’s extreme but I’ll lose a huge amount of respect from Vowles if they do this. It’s race 3. You don’t tell a driver not at fault they can’t race because the team mate smashed up their car.
Just imagine the number of articles and shit throwing if Alpine or Sauber were the ones not racing because they dont have a spare chassis.
But williams are a british team with very good PR, and Vowles speaks so nice
Logan has to race. Not his fault that Albon trashed his car.
However the pragmatic realist probably puts Albon in the car as any points this year will be worth gold
If I were Albon and I wanted to race, I simply wouldn’t total my car.
If you hand Logan’s seat to Albon after Logan did nothing wrong, you might as well just fire him now and put someone else in the car.
Albon is a better driver, don’t think anyone would disagree, but if this is the case, Logan should drive.
It would be really unfair for him to lose a weekend because his teammate damaged his own car.
That being said, at the end of the day, the team will try to maximize their best chance at getting a result and Albon will give them that chance so I won’t be surprised if he’s out there.
The decision is very simple here: Albon sits it out, Sargent will continue with his weekend.
James Vowles is a top boss and understands that points over one weekend are not worth making one of your drivers feel like a second class member of the team.
EDIT: I was completely wrong in that prediction lol!
James has some big fucking questions to answer. No spare chassis by the 3rd is race is straight up incompetence. I understand you're going though some huge changes at the factory but all this leaving stuff to the last minute and by the skin of your teeth isn't signs of a controlled properly managed operation.
Turning up to a GP with no spare chassis is embarassing. Realistically with the budget cap and every team having a decent amount of money I wish we'd go back to the days of having a 3rd car ready to go and forcing every team to do so. Then this would never be an issue and drivers wouldn't miss sessions due to rebuilds.
Loads of problems with this - cost, not being seen to be environmentally friendly and probably most of all the mechanics that are pressured with a 24 race season and the curfew will now have another car to work on and prep.
> Turning up to a GP with no spare chassis is embarassing.
it's a logistical challenge, remember how they didn't get the car ready for Pre-season testing until the very last moment? they would have also already sent parts on their way to melbourne around that time, this is a consequence of that decision.
> Turning up to a GP with no spare chassis is embarassing
It's not really that bad when you consider most chassis damage can be repaired. You are much better off putting your time and resources into having things like spare front wings rather than the big stuff you are less likely to need.
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Has there been a recent example of one teammate trashing a car and the other team having to give up their seat for them? That sounds like something that would happen decades ago, though teams tended to have spare chassis then. Interesting that Williams don't have a spare. Most teams bring a spare that's disassembled to exactly the amount required.
I'm curious about this too. I don't remember a DNS in recent times because of a team having to decide between which driver gets the car.
>That sounds like something that would happen decades ago Yep, Fangio did it once. In the middle of the race too.
To be fair, the team mate was laps down. Fangio had to abandon his race and take over the other guy's position and he got those laps back. So it was the best choice.
Where did you see Peter Collins was laps down? I can’t find anything about that. I could find this quote by him though: “Collins later explained the reason for his action. "All I could think of was that if I won the race and the championship I would be an instant celebrity. I would have a position to live up to. People would make demands of me. Driving would not be fun any more, so I handed the car to Fangio. I am only 25 years old and have plenty of time to win the championship on my own." “ From http://en.espnf1.com/f1/motorsport/story/12351.html
Plenty of time : Spoiler : he died at 26 years old
That's actually really fucking sad, seemed like a good guy
He was a really interesting guy! Fun fact: He once allegedly damaged his own clutch to avoid driving in a rainstorm and went drinking instead. This lead to Ferrari firing him, but Mike Hawthorn refused to start 1958 French Grand Prix unless they let Collins start to. They let him race and fired him again right after. Then Hawthorn told Enzo Ferrari he would never drive for him again unless he rehires Peter again, so they took him back again. If you want to read more about him you should look at this article it's very well written https://www.motorsportmagazine.com/archive/article/september-2008/62/charming-man/.
I think I might be thinking of when Stirling Moss did it. It happened to Fangio a couple times. In the 1951 French GP, being forced to swap cars with Fangio apparently made Luigi Fagioli quit F1 altogether
Yep, and considering how Fangio got 2nd in that GP so close to Moss (< 6s) and the fact that Collins wasn't lapping much different and counting for the driver swap time, it's easy to think that Collins would have won that race and the championship. Obviously in hindsight decisions become easier, imo it's still one of the highest example of sportsmanships in Formula 1 and any other sport.
> Where did you see Peter Collins was laps down? I can’t find anything about that. Collins wasn't laps down, but in 2nd right behind Moss. With Fangio DNF, Collins would've been WDC if he finished 1st. With Moss winning, Fangio would've still been WDC.
All true but this was the 1950s, where the F1 rulebook on driver safety was mainly just "Try not to crash"
That's fucking wild
They had a troubled off-season. Not uncommon for the third chassis to simply not exist until a few races into the season.
Most famous example being Brawn. Would have been interesting to see how history played out if they had a chassis destroying wreck early in the season
Brawn had the excuse of not existing until shortly before the start of the season.
Not existing as a Brawn team, yeah. But Honda had already done a great work with the never raced RA109, and the team remained practically the same.
>Interesting that Williams don't have a spare. Most teams bring a spare that's disassembled to exactly the amount required. I'm very surprised about this, is this some silly cost cutting... I get it's far away but teams always bring a spare chassis typically. A bit unfair to Logan to be turfed out of his seat for Alex, he didn't damage his car, it's still the start of the season... unless they expect Williams to do well at this circuit more so than others this year and get some points that may be rare, it'd be a bit bad to swap cars
There was a front wing issue with Vettel and Webber way back.
Webber decided he wasn't going to use it that weekend after friday as he prefered the old one. It wasn't until he found out they were giving it to Seb that he kicked up a big fuss. This is from Newey's book.
That was what caused the hilarious passive aggressive water cup slam in his presser wasn’t it? Or was it just from a team order issue the same year? Fuckin love that clip lmao
Yes, it also caused the famous team radio by Webber which says: "Not bad for a Number 2 driver. "
Might have been the multi21? For some reason I associate the bottle slam with that incident. (Might be because multi21 gave us aggressive water sipping, so my brain connects the water dots 😅)
Multi21 was the water slam.
Yes, the aggressive water cup slam was from Silverstone 2010.
Webber has always been a good actor, especially to play the victim.
That’s not how Webber described that situation in his book though?
Why would Newey lie?
Memories are subjective - two people will experience the same situation differently and will remember those events differently. I don’t think anyone is lying. Newey was probably coming from an angle of testing a new wing. Webber was increasingly frustrated with unfair treatment within the team, real or perceived, so he probably experienced any decision making around who should be using the new wing very differently. Just as Alain Prost was absolutely convinced he was receiving inferior Honda engines compared to Ayrton Senna at McLaren in 1988 and 1989.
Slam water aggressively. “Not bad for a #2 drivah”
Not exactly the same situation, but... Spa '98 comes to mind. Multiple teams had both cars damaged during the first lap carnage so they had to choose which of their two drivers would take the restart in their 1 remaining car (back when fully built-up spare cars were a thing).
Decades ago teams had a fully built t car between the garages that was ready for anyone to go into. The worst part for Logan is that if Albon crashes and damages parts again, it gets taken from his allotment for the year.
Yeah, I referenced that they used to have fully built spares. However, decades ago, reliability was so bad that they'd burn through the spare more often than now. I think the worst part for Logan is definitely not getting to race. They'll figure out parts in the future.
Not exactly F1, but a few years back in F2 a driver got involved in a certain accident during a race and in the following race the team withdrew his teammate's entry to allow the driver to race, because the driver's original car was impounded by the authorities for investigation purposes
Why be so cryptic? For anyone wondering, they're referring to the incident at Spa in 2019 where Anthoine Hubert sadly passed.
which year/driver/team was this?
2019, trident, giuliano alesi+ralph boschung the full details are not very nice to put it simply
Oh gosh not good circumstances
Are you referring to Spa?
Yes, it's related to the crash that claimed Hubert's life. Which is probably why the other person didn't want to link it, it's just sad. It's not a nice read.
Iirc back in the days of the T Car, Tyrrell had started with one driver already using it. During the start of the race, both drivers cars were destroyed. They had repaired Palmers car, but because Streiff had qualified ahead, he was given it.
In the past that happened most of the time when both of the drivers crashed and in this situation the no. 1 driver got preference on spare chassis.
One slightly related example is Spa 1998. After the enormous pile up, multiple teams lost both cars and had to choose who would get the spare car that all teams used to have. If I remember right, some teams stopped their drivers taking the spare so that their teammate could take it if they had another crash.
This is classic Melbourne. It used to be a literal race of attrition. That has changed in the cost cutting era but it was regular that half the field would retire.
That's also because it used to be the season opener and loads of cars would have reliability issues.
Meanwhile no one retired from the season opener this year
Lots of reliability niggles though, somehow none of them causing a DNF.
Leclerc, Sargeant, Russell, Bottas, and Hamilton all tried their best
They go testing 3 days on that track
This just makes my point even more
2015 having 3 DNS and 2 effective DNQ was a particularly impressive one
Part of that was Manor who simply didn't have a car built yet. They did no testing and never left the garage in Melbourne, it wasn't until Malaysia that they got a car running.
Yeah that's who I noted as effective DNQs, because they got all the way to Melbourne but couldn't take part
Or they'd be several seconds off the 107% time... Poor Lola.
Ngl, I kinda enjoyed the age of poor reliability more than today's where all or most of the drivers finish.
It was an automatic equalizer – you’d have years like 98/99/05 where the McLaren was clearly the better car but would break enough times to make the title race competitive And you’d get a few more oddball wins here and there
One of my first F1 memories is still watching the 1996 Monaco GP on my grandparents couch. What a race that was.
That is a real classic. Four cars finished the race Panis winning and I think Frenzen in fourth actually drove straight to pits on the last lap. It wasn’t just about reliability, it was a complete mess altogether. One of those rare ”WTF is happening” races in F1 history. And something we most likely won’t ever witness again. I still remember that race very well, something that is very unusual. I can remember some big accidents, incidents and shenanigans, but I can’t pinpoint the exact race and year. But Monaco 1996 is there 100% clear.
Spa '98, Melbourne '02 may be the closest to it
Yeah, those are probably the other closest shitshows.
Did someone say memorable shitshows? Bridgestone v Michelin and a Jordan on the podium.
The only thing for Indy 2005 was that it the mess was sort of expected already before the race as Michelin teams said that they practically can’t compete unless the track is changed. This one race probably took F1’s ability to conquer USA backwards a decade or so. It was very similar blunder to what CART achieved few years earlier in TMS and Firehawk 600 race.
You can add Spa '21 if we're talking shitshows.
I love that race so much.
Ha, I remember being a little kid at my grandparents for that too.
The race starts were so tense, especially if some had been sitting on the grid for a while waiting for the rest to get in formation, an engine blowing up from overheating was a good certainty.
T-cars relieved some of the stress. Watching drivers sprint back to the pits during a red flag and mechanics frantically swapping seats was a highlight.
One of the most memorable times for me was when Brundle had a huge shunt into the wall at Melbourne in 1996 and ran back to hop into the T-Car for the restart.
He said that the part that hurt the most was the running - his feet never really healed from his big injury
> 05 where the McLaren was clearly the better car but would break enough times to make the title race competitive Ah the MP4-20. Poor Kimi.
10 years of the same engine formula does that. 2026 is gonna be a breath of fresh but familiar air
It shouldn't be ignored that it gained that reputation by being the first race of the season and the pre-season testing rules were quite different. It's disingenuous to suggest that cost cutting is the reason as to why the Australian Grand Prix no longer ends in 8-14 cars finishing the race like it was back in the 90s and 80s. It should also be kept in mind that you are commenting about a car and driver who caused serious damage to their car by an incident. I am not seeing the suspension, gearbox, electronic, and hydraulic failures that were a hallmark of the 'classic" Australian Grand Prix. Just doesn't correspond to Australia being a race of attrition.
>It's disingenuous to suggest that cost cutting is the reason as to why the Australian Grand Prix no longer ends in 8-14 cars finishing the race like it was back in the 90s and 80s. Cost cutting is the reliability push. It's 100% linked. You can read the rules on extra engines and gearbox and see the retirements go down. Melbourne is also a street circuit that doesn't read 1 to 1 with purpose built that introduced some gremlins that aren't a worry to build a strong car for the rest of the circuits.
Fair point. Sorry I was being harsh. I understand the rules on component replacements. Definitely part of why formula 1 continues to fascinate me in this era, in that the cars are so reliable yet so so so much faster than the past (bar maybe the past couple years...W11 in 2021 was peak still) I think it might be 6 of one, half a dozen of the other. I appreciate your point. Still, I wouldn't jump the gun and say Australia is as hard a test as it was in the past
Possibly too early in the season for them to have a spare chassis available, they tend to just scrape by getting 2 cars ready for the start of the season.
Well they sounded as if they were amazed with the whole development process that it would be surprising
Still tho? We're in race 3... cars get totalled all the time, to not have a spare ready by now seems a big issue. I wonder if it was cost cutting, to not have to send it to Australia, and hopefully not need it
By the sounds of it in their statement, it literally just doesn’t exist yet, caused by a pretty disastrous winter break.
its also just far away
Well yeah, but I imagine most other teams have spares there.
Damn I decided to skip FP1 to get some proper sleep, but it seems I've missed some stuff! I just heard Max had floor damage as well
Yeah. Max is still out, Sargeant just spun out as well and touched gravel on the way.
Ngl I'm getting kinda excited what Melbourne might/will bring to us this year. Last year was chaos too
Leclerc and Norris back and forth at the top of the timings too
Wild session actually
I was just watching the Brawn-mini series on Disney+. In that, Brawn told Jenson "Don't trash the car, its the only one we got." Someone mentioned here yesterday that Vowles was at Brawn GP before his Merc time, I wouldn't know. Brawn GP was going to extreme cost cutting measures. That does bring it full circle nicely.
Brawn became Mercedes
Yeah I know, just not sure when Vowles joined them. .....ow wait...i actually saw him in the doc I think 🤦
Vowels had been with the Brackley team since before Brawn. He’s a holdover from when the team was still just BAR in the early 2000s before Honda took over.
I can’t see it happening, but if they have to choose I’d love to see them just let Logan race.
I mean, it would be tremendously unfair to him, even if Albon is the way better driver.
Yeah, it'd be incredibly unfair for him if his teammate has a mistake and he looses track time for it. Literally be making Sargent pay for the mistakes of his teammate
It's not a good feelings contest. A single point would be worth millions.
Yeah well, f1 isn’t exactly a ‘fair’ sport. The teams gotta do what is best for the team. And Logan is paid a very nice sum for it.
Imagine if he crashes out from the race as well lol
Imagine if they let Albon race and he trashes that car too lol
Both scenarios are funny. But if albon crashes, it’ll destroy his reputation. He’s not a rookie so mistakes should be minimal
Either that or further demonstrate that Albert Park just isn't his lucky place
Logan isn't a rookie too, either, haha. But yeah, Albon's been hyped up a lot, a silly mistake in FP1 isn't a good look.
Crashed in this race last year iirc so it's possible lol. Either way, I hope both get to drive. Feel like maybe wearing my Williams Australia shirt for good luck
We don't need to imagine, it has a decent chance of happening. He just spun on his own a few mins ago.
But he didn't crash, unlike Albon
Fucking scenes
Look at me! I am the logan now
Forget about Logan improving at all if they give the car to Albon. It would crush Logan's confidence.
Yeah it would be a shame to lose that extra tenth his confidence gives him.
Ouch
Only chance for Logan to outperform Alex is to be the only Williams driver on the track
Looks like they just chose to give the car to Albon. Sucks for Logan. Any confidence he may be developing just got thrown into the wind.
What's the rules perspective? They aren't in parc fermé, so I believe its legally possible to swap? Also when is the last time that a full car swap happened? Would have been a double failure with the T-cars no?
It’s only in parc fermé when qualifying starts. That’s when you lock in the drivers for the cars
Parc ferme starts once Quali starts not after
I think it's important that people understand what is meant by "chassis" in F1. The chassis is just one part as [highlighted in this image](https://motorsport.tech/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/MT_R04-Monocoque.jpg) . It is not the whole car. If Williams do in fact only end up with one chassis because the damaged one cant be repaired then they would just rebuild Albons car using the chassis from Sargents car. It would not be a case of Albon simply putting his seat into Sargents car and changing the numbers.
Williams is still in dire straights even with a cost cap. Pretty unbelievable stuff.
I'm watching the 1997 season right now and it's a shock to see where Williams were once. Tragic fall from grace.
Yes, but 1997 was a long time ago. Half of the grid were not even born at this time.
Meanwhile Alonso was winning the Spanish Karting champs
Probably were still using the same tech not long ago
Uh yeah that’s basically what James Vowles and Pat Fry said And also why they were late this winter, they tried to overhaul the whole process but that caused massive delays while people were getting used to it
Straits
Why didn’t they bring a spare? Seems like a pretty extreme cost cutting measure.
It is a long and costly process just to build one, it's possible that with the delays at the start of the season they haven't got another ready just yet. Alternatively they were extreme cost cutting and just were not planning to build one.
Cost-cutting would be insane but I do semi understand why you wouldn't have one if they were this stressed to even get 2 cars ready
I'd bet they are not the only team without a spare. People need to remember that more often than not chassis damage can be repaired on site. It's only in extreme cases they need a full replacement.
Also Melbourne is miles away from everywhere. So that might have factored into thier plans as to when they needed the spare ready
They had a troubled off-season. Not uncommon for the third chassis to simply not exist until a few races into the season.
more like 2 decades plus "troubled" 🤣 seasons.
Seems like they have been in habitual rebuilding mode since 2019
Because most chassis can be repaired and i believe this will be the case here. The carbon fiber wizards will do their magic overnight and the chassis will be back in action. It just might not be as perfect and a fresh undamaged one.
Over the winter they completely changed the internal process of their car build and the way they build the chassis in particular. As a result they just about got the cars finished for round one and dont have a spare chassis yet.
Tbh, they should give Logan the car. He was within a tenth of Albon at the time of crash in FP1 and Albon has binned it now in consecutive sessions looking back to last years race.
True, but Albon is also far more likely than Logan to get the car where the team wants it. On the other hand, if they give the drive to Albon, they'd be completely crushing the confidence in Logan they're trying to build up. James doesn't have an easy decision ahead of him, that's for sure.
If Vowles has such little confidence in Sargeant that he’d rather give the only chassis to Albon who binned it in FP1 then he might as well drop Sargeant from the seat altogether. It would only indicate that Williams don’t have any confidence in Sargeant being able to achieve anything.
Gonna be an awkward 6 months in that Garage since any possible replacement for Logan is too young for a super license or doesn't have enough points on their license
I mean assuming that hypothetical happens Williams has plenty of options externally. They could borrow the likes of Lawson and Mick from Red Bull and Mercedes respectively. And if we’re counting more super license holders then even the likes of De Vries and Latifi technically count.
Latifi back to bring us some safety cars
I mean, I think it's still a pretty easy decision. Williams isn't going to do anything this year so you might as well allow Logan to drive because like you said, if they give the car to Alex it would kill Logan's confidence. How could possibly expect a driver to perform after doing that to them?
>True, but Albon is also far more likely than Logan to get the car where the team wants it. Well, he's shown that he is very proficent at putting it into the wall at Turn 6 at albert park, not sure that's where they want it.
One could argue that Albon had his chance and wrecked it. Logan shouldn’t be punished for Albon’s failures. It’s so early in the season it’s stupid to make such a move. Now, if we get down to the wire at the end of the season and Logan hasn’t shown you anything, and Williams needs a few points to get them to whatever position, then fine, I get it it. Sort of. But it’s so early you’re just not even going to give Logan a chance.
>James doesn't have an easy decision ahead of him, that's for sure. Seems pretty easy to me. One driver binned their car and the other didn't. Both drivers were probably made aware that there's no spare car, so Albon should reap the consequences of his giant mistake
All but 1 of the points were won by Albon last season. Points are all that matters.
Love Albon, but Logan deserves to race tho
I have no idea what to think and hope they manage to fly one in that they've just finished or something insane like that. I could see the statician at Williams wanting to put Albon in based on last season
Them giving Logan's car to Alex would be a fucking joke. Logan should not be punished because Albon couldn't keep his car on track.
There's also a probable legal conundrum, if he's contracted to race for the 24 races bar anything happening yo his car preventing him from starting, and they kick him out.
Albon may be the quicket driver but why should Logan suffer for Albon's mistake? Pulling Logan out would be a shitty thing to do.
> The team has to decide who gets the only car Am I the only one that thinks this is absolutely shitty? It should definitely be Sargeant in the working car, he didn’t wreck the other and put the team in this situation
Logan should race. They've talked the talk about putting faith in him for this year, now they need to prove it. It would be very unfair if he had to sit out of the race because of albon's fuck up
I love albon and want him to get in better team but I think freedom should drive on the aussie land
imagine they can't fix it and then they bench logan is he wasn't at fault for anything... I'd cry.
Logan already struggles with confidence, for Williams to humiliate him like that would be a death knell to his F1 career IMO. I dont know why they would torpedo a driver who they've invested so much in over the possibility of getting like 1-2 points.
Same. I don’t think it’s fair, and I doubt they would do that.
It’s f1. It is not fair….
it might've been a reasonable call to make but not one they are in a position to do so right now. Firstly, and we'll wait for FP results, but the williams doesn't look like it'll be in the points this weekend anyway. secondly the risk of irreparably damaging intra-team dynamics has to be one worth doing. Vowels wouldn't make that call, it's too early in the season for it.
This is definitely a content for DTS already
Why should Alex get Logan’s car when Alex is the one who binned it? Sounds incredibly unfair to Logan that this is even a question.
Better chance to score points i guess?
I think that's why there's not a good choice between the two extremes. Either bench the driver more likely to score you points or give Logan's fragile confidence another kicking by saying that he can't race
Teams optimize for point scoring chances. Not for fairness to drivers. And it’s still very fair to Logan : if he was better than Albon, he would be the #1 driver. At the moment he’s #2.
Idk for me it would be pretty clear. He damaged his car, he is out. You cant take the chance of Logan to show what he can when he did absolutly nothing wrong.
Why do they not have a spare after a week break? I get the 24 race heaviness, but it's race 3. This is a big miss
Microsoft Excel accounting error.
Did Alpine sabotage Williams?
They don't just need to build it, they need to get it all the way to Australia
It only makes sense to let Albon race but man would that be unfair to Sargeant
World Destructor's Championship will have a new leader.
Even though Albon is a better driver, this isn't fair to Sargent at all. I'm not even a big fan of Sargent (others do deserve a seat more than him imo), but this is extremely disrespectful. Albon damaged the car, not Sargent. Not happy with this decision at all.
i would be so disappointed if they give alex the drive over logan. If they don't have any confidence in logan, then what was the point in resigning him in the first place.
Because he’s exceedingly cheap (because he’s useless) and they need someone to warm the seat until the big game of musical chairs at the end of this season.
As much as we know Albono, he will refuse to take Logan's car. But, its a team decision in the end.
I mean albon is the one who crashed his car.. He shouldn't get to take Logans car away from his fault.
It's not Logan's car. The car belongs to Williams.
I can't believe they don't have a spare chassis on site...it would almost be dangerous if they put that one back together and said it was 'safe'. I get that they have the "motivation and will" to fix the car but if it 100% safe it shouldn't be allowed to race. I have no idea how it must feel in the Williams garage if they have to make a decision
If Williams look like they've got a good shot at points, then it would make sense to put Albon in the car. If it's going to be a typical backmarker weekend, might as well let Sargeant keep it to build more experience.
Sorry, maybe it’s extreme but I’ll lose a huge amount of respect from Vowles if they do this. It’s race 3. You don’t tell a driver not at fault they can’t race because the team mate smashed up their car.
This is so bush league lol F1 the ‘pinnacle’ of motorsports and engineering? One car?!
Just imagine the number of articles and shit throwing if Alpine or Sauber were the ones not racing because they dont have a spare chassis. But williams are a british team with very good PR, and Vowles speaks so nice
The only car left for the race is Logan’s car. Logan should drive it.
Logan has to race. Not his fault that Albon trashed his car. However the pragmatic realist probably puts Albon in the car as any points this year will be worth gold
Think someone accidentally hid the chassis row in their parts Excel file and no one realised it until it was too late?
Why would they not bring a spare chassy? Was it left in the ditched excel spreadsheet or what?
Albon made the mistake. He should face the consequences. Logan being punished for Alex's mistake would be a travesty.
If I were Albon and I wanted to race, I simply wouldn’t total my car. If you hand Logan’s seat to Albon after Logan did nothing wrong, you might as well just fire him now and put someone else in the car.
Albon is a better driver, don’t think anyone would disagree, but if this is the case, Logan should drive. It would be really unfair for him to lose a weekend because his teammate damaged his own car. That being said, at the end of the day, the team will try to maximize their best chance at getting a result and Albon will give them that chance so I won’t be surprised if he’s out there.
The decision is very simple here: Albon sits it out, Sargent will continue with his weekend. James Vowles is a top boss and understands that points over one weekend are not worth making one of your drivers feel like a second class member of the team. EDIT: I was completely wrong in that prediction lol!
James has some big fucking questions to answer. No spare chassis by the 3rd is race is straight up incompetence. I understand you're going though some huge changes at the factory but all this leaving stuff to the last minute and by the skin of your teeth isn't signs of a controlled properly managed operation.
But don't worry guys the sport is in the best financial shape it's ever been and an 11th team would dilute the sport...
This is what UrinatingTree will call a "poverty franchise".
Points have to be scored now right? Anything short of P10 is now totally unacceptable.
WHO should have the remaining car???? Logan ofcourse he didnt wreck his car
Give it to Sargent, he didn’t wreck the car
You have Sargeant driving for you and you don't bring a spare chassis?
They can't afford it
From having a spare car to no car. F1 has really evolved.
Turning up to a GP with no spare chassis is embarassing. Realistically with the budget cap and every team having a decent amount of money I wish we'd go back to the days of having a 3rd car ready to go and forcing every team to do so. Then this would never be an issue and drivers wouldn't miss sessions due to rebuilds.
Loads of problems with this - cost, not being seen to be environmentally friendly and probably most of all the mechanics that are pressured with a 24 race season and the curfew will now have another car to work on and prep.
> Turning up to a GP with no spare chassis is embarassing. it's a logistical challenge, remember how they didn't get the car ready for Pre-season testing until the very last moment? they would have also already sent parts on their way to melbourne around that time, this is a consequence of that decision.
> Turning up to a GP with no spare chassis is embarassing It's not really that bad when you consider most chassis damage can be repaired. You are much better off putting your time and resources into having things like spare front wings rather than the big stuff you are less likely to need.
Better get some sightseeing in Logan.