Alex Albon was a serious contender for being the United States Grand Prix’s Mr. Saturday, after a stellar performance saw the Thai driver come within three-hundredths of a second of making the Q3 cut.
There is no doubt that Albon is getting more out of Williams’ FW44 than most drivers would be capable of, considering that the 26-year-old qualified P12, whereas Nicholas Latifi was last.
Albon was unable to improve on his personal best in Q2 on his final lap and would’ve actually been P13, had Zhou Guanyu’s time not been deleted for exceeding track limits.
Regardless of that, P12 is an unbelievable achievement by the former Red Bull driver, who like the entire paddock was most likely driving deeply saddened by the loss of Red Bull co-founder Dietrich Mateschitz.
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Mateschitz’s death was announced by the Austrians right before qualifying, with the exceptional man dying at the age of 78.
Albon drove for Red Bull for roughly 18 months, starting from the 2019 Belgian Grand Prix to the end of the 2020 season, where he was then dropped.
He previously raced for AlphaTauri for the first half of the 2019 season but had been a Red Bull junior driver since 2012.
The Williams driver will actually not be starting from P12 on Sunday at the Circuit of the Americas, with an absurd number of drivers having been awarded grid penalties once again for exceeding their power unit component pool.
It means that points could very well be on the cards for the now blonde-haired driver on Sunday, something which will come as a pleasant surprise to the team’s American owners, Dorilton Capital.
Williams actually made a very big announcement ahead of qualifying, with it having been announced that Williams Academy and Formula 2 driver Logan Sargeant will be partnering Albon next season, should he finish in the top seven of the F2 Drivers’ Championship.
Albon’s qualifying performance certainly demonstrated, though, that he is the number one in the Grove-based team, following his results this season.
It was actually almost a Q1 elimination for Albon in Austin, after the Thai driver had to take an abnormal line through Turn Two whilst on a hot lap.
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Hamilton appeared to obstruct the Williams driver, who quickly asked his radio if they saw what the seven-time World Champion had done.
“Did you see Lewis [Hamilton] there?” asked Albon to his team.
Albon isn’t the only driver whose complained about the Mercedes star this weekend, with veteran Fernando Alonso having also been disgruntled by the 37-year-old in FP2 on Friday.