Alex Albon was left “very angry with myself” after crashing out of the Australian Grand Prix.
The Williams driver had been a strong performer all weekend at Albert Park, qualifying in eighth thanks to the straight line speed of the FW45.
Then, Albon gained two places to run sixth after the opening lap on race day, but his hopes of a big result ended on Lap 7 after spinning off into the barrier at Turn 6, resulting in the first of three red flags.
“It’s obviously disappointing,” he said. “Firstly it’s my mistake and apologies to the team.
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“It’s one of those things that clearly looking at the results today and seeing where everyone is at, there was a good chance for points.
“We need to score points when we can, especially when there are opportunities to score points.
“There are a few cars out of place, out of sequence. That’s when we need to do well. Everything was looking up until my mistake. So I’m very angry with myself.”
Explaining the crash at Turn 6, Albon continued: “When I lost the car I was going through there slower than the lap before.
A heartbreaking end to Alex Albon’s promising Grand Prix weekend ?#AusGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/yueJ1Ylpao
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“I went a little bit wider at Turn 5, went onto the kerb. I didn’t think too much of it, to be honest, but looking at the data briefly it spiked the tyre temperature by a little bit.
“With these tyres, these Pirellis, we get punished if we slide. I think that’s the cause.”
The crash also led to some close calls as Albon’s car bounced back onto the side of the track in a cloud of dust.
“Holy moly, I mean seriously I had a code brown in that moment,” Haas’ Nico Hulkenberg admitted.
“That was seriously scary, I mean, thank God nothing happened. But this is a nightmare scenario when you’ve come around a blind corner in a street circuit.
“I mean, that was seriously scary and sketchy. That’s a bad example of a driver losing the car, crashing and coming back onto the track, and because there’s a gravel trap, there was dust, so you could not really see much.
You need lightning reflexes at all times in F1…
As @HulkHulkenberg demonstrates ??#AusGP #F1 pic.twitter.com/xuLtx1lmaO
— Formula 1 (@F1) April 4, 2023
“I think Pierre [Gasly] was in front of me, he was the first car, I was the second car, and no marshal in the world can react that fast.
“We didn’t have yellow flags, I just saw the cloud of dust and I saw gravel flying around, so I sort of didn’t take the ideal or normal racing line, I went a bit wider.
“I think I still didn’t miss him by much though, I immediately shouted on the radio that we need a Safety Car and that it was a dangerous situation.”