Albon told to be “harder” with his team to get the best out of them

Alexander Albon has been told to demand more from his Williams team if he wants to be Formula 1 world champion in the future.

Williams technical officer FX Demaison praised the contribution Albon has made since joining them this year but said he needs to push them harder to get the car more to his liking.

“[He] was a really good help for us because we are only engineers, we need a driver to give us a direction,” said Demaison in today’s FIA press conference. “His experience… helped us and has given us the right direction. So it’s really a good help.”

Albon is “a nice person, sometimes too nice,” said Demaison. “But [he] needs to be sometimes a bit more hard with the team and push us a bit more. But we are working on this.”

He does tend to be more forceful in race situations, Demaison admitted. “When he has the helmet on, yes, he can be hard but it should be a bit more harder in debriefs,” he said. “I explain [to] him, everyday I tell him you have to be – a word I will not pronounce – but if you want to be a world champion, you have to be like this.”

Before joining Williams, Albon spent a year as Red Bull’s reserve driver, prior to which he raced alongside current world champion Max Verstappen at the team for a year and a half.

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Red Bull’s chief engineer Paul Monaghan said they had been satisfied with Albon’s feedback during his time at the team, despite relegating him from their race line-up at the end of 2020.

“Thinking back to Alex’s time with us he came across as a very conscientious, polite, gifted driver and he had a pretty good idea of what he wanted from the car straight off,” said Monaghan. “He knew when it wasn’t to his liking and could tell you what was to his disliking. We didn’t always manage to give him a car that was adequate for his wants.

“Obviously he had a pretty rapid team mate, which puts a little bit more pressure on him, and he handled that, I thought, exceptionally well for a young driver.”

Monaghan admitted Albon was “frustrated” when he was left out of an F1 race seat last year but was “able to deal with his situation” and “was learning and worked with us.”

“Now he’s come back with FX’s team and it’s nice to see him nearer the front of the grid,” Monaghan added. “It’s nice to see the progress and it’s nice to see them scoring points.

“So full credit to Alex for enduring a reasonably tough time, learning, not being despondent and pushing himself on to achieve what his talents deserve. So many congratulations to him and long may his growth in sport continue.”

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