Paddy Lowe felt it was a ‘relatively good day’ for Williams Martini Racing on Sunday at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez despite Lance Stroll and Sergey Sirotkin being classified twelfth and thirteenth.
Williams has not had the best of seasons with only seven points scored in the opening nineteen races of the season, with the FW41 often being off the pace of the rest of the midfield runners in that time, and heading into the Mexican Grand Prix, the duo started seventeenth and nineteenth respectively.
Stroll went for a two-stop strategy and Sirotkin for just the one, but it was the latter who had the seemingly had the superior pace in the closing laps as he managed to pass Kevin Magnussen for fourteenth, while both drivers gained a position at the chequered flag thanks to a five-second time penalty for Brendon Hartley.
Lowe, the chief technical officer of Williams, says that based on the performance level of the 2018 car, the result was a positive one for the team as they managed to avoid going home with the wooden spoon.
“Considering our general performance level that was a relatively good day,” said Lowe. “Again, two cars home in good condition, which is a positive for the team.
“It was a very tough race with tyre management, both drivers showed themselves extremely competent at controlling their pace and controlling the use of the tyre. That’s what made the difference for them in the end to beat some of the cars out there this afternoon.”
Williams now sit twenty-six points behind Red Bull Toro Rosso Honda in the Constructors’ Championship with just two races remaining, while Alfa Romeo Sauber F1 Team are a further three points ahead after both Charles Leclerc and Marcus Ericsson scored points in Mexico.
