Williams is facing another significant repair job to keep two cars running at the Japanese Grand Prix, following Logan Sargeant’s crash in FP1, but the team says the chassis escaped serious damage.
Sargeant had to sit out the Australian Grand Prix weekend after teammate Alex Albon crashed in FP1 two weeks ago, as Williams does not have a spare chassis and could not repair Albon’s car at the track.
This time around it was the American’s turn to have an incident in the first practice session, as he ran wide at Turn 7 and dipped two wheels onto the grass on the outside of the circuit. Eventually the car broke traction and Sargeant spun at high speed, bouncing across an access road and the gravel before hitting the tire barrier with the nose of the car first.
FP1 was temporarily red-flagged after this Logan Sargeant crash #F1 #JapaneseGP pic.twitter.com/dPN5ek6CBl
— Formula 1 (@F1) April 5, 2024
The car snapped around with the left-rear corner also hitting the barrier before it came to a stop, with the corner impact the type that can cause chassis damage due to the stresses put on the suspension mounting points. However, after the incident, team principal James Vowles confirmed the chassis survived the impact and the car will be able to continue this weekend.
“It’s pretty significant [damage],” Vowles said. “The chassis is OK, fortunately, but I would says pretty much everything else isn’t. So, suspension all-round, gearbox cracked, big damage.
“It’s going to be difficult [to be ready for FP2]. We’ll obviously do our utmost to try and get the car back out there again, but the damage is extensive, so it will take a while.”
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Vowles says the error that caused the crash was an unusual situation of Sargeant being unaware of where he was on track through the blind crest of Turn 7, rather than a result of him trying to prove a point after being withdrawn in Melbourne.
“At the top of the brow of the hill there, he struggled to see where his positioning was on track,” he said. “So it fundamentally looks like he didn’t quite realize where he was, with where the grass was on the outside, and put a wheel on the grass.
“I’ve been chatting to him all week — all these last few weeks in fact — because this is the point you’ve got to keep a driver very close to you. You’ve given them a very difficult situation to deal with, through no fault of their own, but he was honestly in a very good state of mind this week and last night again when I called him around 9-10pm; a really, really strong state of mind.
“He just wanted to get back into the car and get going, but not with the intention of proving to the world that he deserves his seat, just his normal approach to things. What you saw here wasn’t a driver making a mistake because they were pushing to the limit — it’s a very different type of mistake. A very frustrating one by all accounts, because it wasn’t on the limit of what the car could do — there was far more turning potential in there, he just didn’t know where the car was on track, relative to where he expected it to be anyway.
“So I don’t think you’re seeing there the reaction of someone who wasn’t driving in Melbourne, I think you’re seeing more just a situation that could have appeared anytime.”
Williams is not the only team without a spare chassis in Japan, with Alpine team principal Bruno Famin confirming that his team also does not have a spare. While Williams is looking at Miami at the earliest for its spare chassis, Famin says Alpine will have one at the next round in China.