Williams faced fresh FIA confusion in Bahrain, as a botched penalty call on Sainz nearly cost the team valuable early momentum.
After getting hit by an FIA error in qualifying, Williams F1 found itself in another mess during the Bahrain Grand Prix — a situation that once again raised eyebrows over the FIA’s handling of penalties.
The chaos began when Carlos Sainz received a 10-second penalty for an incident involving Andrea Kimi Antonelli. After the race, the FIA announced that Sainz had not served the penalty, meaning he’d face a three-place grid drop at the next round in Saudi Arabia.
Except… he had served it. Williams had held Sainz in the pits for 10 seconds before retiring the car. It was yet another misstep from the FIA, who later walked back the grid penalty. Still, the Spaniard keeps two penalty points on his license for the incident.
Despite the drama, Sainz reflected on the weekend with a mix of frustration and optimism:
“Honestly, we were fighting all race long against faster cars,” he said.
“It’s frustrating — you push harder to keep up, the tyres degrade quicker, and you fall back. It got tight with Yuki. He went inside, lost the rear, and hit me. I had damage that cost us maybe a second, a second and a half per lap. We had to retire.”
“It’s a shame because I think points were possible for the first time this season. We’re missing a bit of pace and need to improve in a few areas — but we’re heading in the right direction.”
“In the midfield, if you’re not perfect, you don’t score. We fought hard, wore out the tyres, and dropped down the order. Then came the contact with Yuki. It wasn’t the clean weekend I was hoping for, but we’re getting closer.”
As for Alex Albon, his race was undone by poor timing and bad luck. The Thai driver missed out on points for the first time this year:
“We had enough — more than enough, actually,” Albon said.
“We were making solid progress on the hard tyres and aiming for eighth. But then the safety car came out. We had to double-stack, and I lost a bunch of places.”
“It feels like a missed opportunity. We didn’t qualify where we should have, and we didn’t bounce back like we wanted to. The safety car just came at the wrong time. It wasn’t a bad weekend — just unlucky.”
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How Williams F1 Almost Got Caught in Another FIA Blunder How Williams F1 Almost Got Caught in Another FIA Blunder
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