Carlos Sainz and Alex Albon look back: A curious shortcut during the drivers’ parade in Brazil caused the Williams drivers to have a laughing fit.
Carlos Sainz and Alex Albon looked back on their first season together in Formula 1 with Williams. The two drivers cited an unusual scene away from the actual racing as their favorite memory: the drivers’ parade at the Sao Paulo Grand Prix in Interlagos.
“That’s definitely when we laughed the most. We laughed non-stop for five minutes. We couldn’t speak for five minutes,” Sainz recalled in an episode of the Williams podcast Team Torque. Special kit cars were provided for the parade in Sao Paulo, with one car allocated to each team. The design featured a driver at the wheel and a pickup-style seat in the back for the co-driver.
Why Albon was behind the wheel
When Sainz and Albon realized on their way to the starting grid that there was only one vehicle per team, they spontaneously raced for the driver’s seat. Albon won the sprint and took the wheel.
On the start-finish straight, he put his foot down on the accelerator, but quickly realized that the vehicle lacked the hoped-for speed. To compensate for the lack of engine power, both drivers discovered a shortcut between turns 4 and 12 and took full advantage of this opportunity.
“The moment we knew our car wasn’t fast, our intuition kicked in and we figured out how we could still win,” explained Albon. Sainz added: “At that moment, we made the decision to take a massive shortcut. Instead of 13 corners, we only drove five, and we simply cut across country where necessary to finish the lap in first place. I enjoyed that.”
Creative line choice not enough for victory
Despite the creative line choice, it wasn’t quite enough for victory in the unofficial parade standings. The two Williams drivers finished third behind the Alpine and Ferrari cars. However, this did not dampen the mood.
“From the moment we made the decision to the moment we crossed the finish line, we couldn’t stop laughing for maybe three or four minutes,” Sainz concluded.
