Albon reflects on how latest crash will set back Williams

Alex Albon says the crash he suffered at the start of the Japanese Grand Prix will hurt Williams due to its lack of spare parts and chassis.

Daniel Ricciardo moved across as Albon was trying to pull alongside on the run to Turn 3, with the pair making contact and both hitting the same tire barrier. The damage to the barrier caused a red flag and while Albon was understanding of the decision not to penalize Ricciardo -- who was also fighting with Lance Stroll and had a tire disadvantage -- he says the impact on Williams could be painful.

“Softs against mediums starting, so (I) had a grip advantage,” Albon said. “Kind of prized the grip I had out of Turn 2 and was able to crawl underneath him and have a good run into Turn 3. It was more about just trying to get him a little bit offline from Turn 3 and try and find a way for 4/5/6/7 to see if I could upset his line a little bit.

“Obviously just one of those things. He didn't see me, clearly. I tried to back out of it last minute. There was a moment where I realized ‘he hasn't seen me here’ and the way he's pulling across, it’s tricky. So I hit the brakes and tried to get out of it. But we're almost too far alongside him that as I’ve backed out of it, he still was coming across and I couldn't avoid it.

“It's no secret that we are having a tough time with it at the moment with the parts we've got, and this is gonna hurt us for sure.”

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Williams could only run one car in Melbourne as a result of Albon’s FP1 crash that damaged his chassis, and the team won’t have a spare before Miami. Albon admits he was thinking of the potential repercussions as the crash was unfolding, although Williams team principal James Vowles later told RACER the initial images before the car was returned to the garage suggested the chassis had survived the incident.

“The impact itself was relatively low speed, but it's the way that I hit the tire wall,” Albon added. “Normally, we have these kind of plastic barriers but this was much more dug in, and it really stops very violently. They're the questions I'm worried about -- not for me, for the car -- because that's where you can do damage. We haven't had the car back yet, we need to assess it. Hopefully, it's OK.

“Immediately, as soon as I was before I even hit the wall, it was like, ‘This is exactly what we don't need.' We need to assess it and try and come back strong for China.”