Franco Colapinto declares points finish ‘a dream come true’ as Williams celebrate double success in Baku

Now leaving Azerbaijan with a further 10 factors, they’ve leapfrogged Alpine into eighth place within the constructors’ standings with seven races remaining. Albon additionally matched his greatest race end with Williams, briefly operating in P3 round Baku earlier than he boxed to vary tyres.

“It was truly sudden for us to be in that form of awkward place the place we had been within the combine with the leaders,” he stated. “Clearly we didn’t pit but however we had been dropping a variety of race time due to all of the combating that was happening round me.

FACTS AND STATS: Red Bull lose constructors’ lead after 55 races and Bearman makes rookie history

“I didn’t count on it, we didn’t count on it, we thought we might have fairly a easy race. I didn’t actually know the place my race was, I didn’t know the place I used to be going to come back out, it was all a little bit bit unknown. Truthfully, we had been okay within the second stint, I believed I may get Fernando [Alonso] however he had an important finish to his race, he was fast on the finish so didn’t fairly get him.”

Albon added that the group discovered their spectacular efficiency to be “a real shock” nevertheless it demonstrated that “the bundle is working effectively” going into the ultimate a part of the season.