Saturday’s final practice at the Dutch Grand Prix saw wet and rainy conditions disrupt the session, and a further disruption came near the end of the hour as Logan Sargeant slammed into the barrier near Turn 5. The massive shunt caused significant damage to his FW46 and touched off a dangerous situation as Sargeant scrambled from the cockpit and the rear of the car caught fire.
The damage was too much for the team to overcome, as Sargeant was unable to take to the track in qualifying.
Following the session, the American driver lamented a “small mistake with a big consequence” that ruined his day.
“It was a small mistake with a big consequence, just touching the grass and that was it. Obviously, a big hit but I’m ok,” said Sargeant in the team’s post-qualifying report. “There’s a lot to fix on the car so I feel for everyone working on it tonight to get it ready for tomorrow. All we can do is regroup, go again and try and have a good race.”
Things were much better for Williams on the other side of the garage. While Alexander Albon was not able to match his qualifying performance from a year ago, when he placed fourth, Albon stormed into Q3 and finished eighth, his best qualifying result of the 2024 campaign.
“I’m really happy with P8 and that our upgrades have helped us secure this position,” said Albon. “It’s been very windy and gusty out there and it seems like if you were 10 seconds behind another car, they could have a completely different wind to you and it was halves of seconds that were in the wind, so it felt a little like the lottery.
“We’ve made a big step with the weight as well as the aero upgrade and it’s not the complete package either with more to come soon, so it’s all looking positive,” added Albon. “The car felt strong and got better on each lap, so it’s great to get this result in these conditions today and to see the upgrades working well. We can all be happy, so a big thank you to the team for working hard to have the updates ready.
Williams enters the Dutch Grand Prix sitting ninth in the Constructors’ Championship with four points on the year, seven points behind eighth-place Alpine. But Albon heads into Sunday’s main event riding high.
“We’ll be in the mix tomorrow, I’m feeling confident.”
Returning to Sargeant, the consequences of that “small mistake” could be even bigger than just missing out on qualifying. According to reporting from Erik van Haren from De Telegraaf, the incident could lead to Team Principal James Vowles replacing Sargeant this season. According to this reporting Vowles is looking at perhaps Mick Schumacher or Liam Lawson as options for Williams the rest of the season.
