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F1 fans were left reeling as they pointed to Alex Albon's expression while his new Williams F1 teammate Franco Colapinto was talking about the ex-driver Logan Sargeant. Ahead of the Italian GP weekend, the Grove-based outfit made a surprising decision to make a change to their driver lineup by dropping the American driver in favor of rookie Franco Colapinto.
The Argentine has been racing in the F2 for the 2024 season for MP Motorsport and stood in P6 in the driver's championship before getting promoted to the iconic British team for the remainder of the 2024 season.
While addressing the team ahead of the race in Monza, Franco Colapinto spoke about Logan Sargeant with the team and said:
"Of course, I know that many of you are close to Logan and I, of course, feel him for what happened but you never choose your moment to enter Formula 1 and the sport is like that. I'm gonna try to get up to speed as soon as possible," Colapinto said.
F1 fans took to X(formerly Twitter) to give their reactions to Franco Colapinto's comments, with one fan pointing out that Williams F1 driver Alex Albon wasn't pleased with the decision to drop the American, saying:
"All I'm gonna say is Alex looks mad."
"I wanna know what he said behind those doors because he does NOT look happy…"
"Rather than mad, he looks devastated."
"The one person who probably knows how logan is feeling is Alex as he went through it with Red Bull." a fan commented.
"You can definitely tell hes either pissed, or very uncomfortable, and I don’t blame him one bit." wrote another.
"Alex looks like he regrets signing a contract with them," a user claimed.
Williams F1 team boss addresses reports regarding Franco Colapinto
Williams F1 team principal James Vowles said that Franco Colapinto was not a paid driver as he did not bring any money with him despite some new sponsors joining the Grove-based outfit from Latin America last week.
Speaking with Sky Sports, Vowles said (via "Crash.net"):
“He brings no money with him. What has been exceptional is that the moment we informed him and his management of our decision, the phone hasn’t stopped ringing with Argentinian companies coming on board. What you’ll see appearing on the car is stickers. They are paying the right value, and the right rate for it," he said.
“It’s not money because of Franco (Colapinto). They want exposure on the car and to be proud that we’re running an Argentinian driver. If you know him, you know that throughout his career he’s been on a shoestring budget, without any money. He hasn’t got anything to his name,” Vowles added.
In his first outing as a Williams F1 driver, the 21-year-old qualified P18 for the Italian GP main race on Sunday.
