Spanish Formula 1 driver Carlos Sainz (Williams) confirmed that seventh place was the “maximum” he could achieve on Sunday at the Las Vegas Grand Prix, and stated that the points achieved “helped a lot” as fifth place in the World Constructors’ Championship “consolidated more and more” for Williams.
“In the end, these cars that beat us were 2 or 3 tenths of a second faster during the whole race, and one way or another they ended up beating you,” he told DAZN after the race. “I’m happy with seventh place, because it was the most we could do today. With a little conservative pit stop, which allowed us to ‘undercut’ Bestre, and ‘overtake’ Leclerc, but maybe sooner or later… seventh was the best.”
In this sense, the Madrid native confirmed that this seventh place was also the result expected in previous races. “Seventh is where we should have finished in Austin, where we should have finished in Mexico… so I’m happy that here we are, at least, we got the result,” he said.
On the other hand, he told how he tried to benefit from the suspension of Italian Kimi Antonelli (Mercedes), who was penalized for five seconds due to a false start. “I tried to do everything I could to stay within five seconds of Antonelli,” he said. “I think I got within 4.8 seconds, but trying to keep up with his speed opened up the field and we had to go back a little bit.”
He continued: “We have to take into account that we were ten seconds ahead of Hajjar, who is second in the midfield. We were only three or four seconds behind Leclerc and Piasti. I think we had a very good race, with a very good pace, and the problem is that the others ran too much and we were in no man’s land a little bit.”
Finally, Sainz highlighted that his Sunday position in Nevada will allow Williams to settle for fifth in the World Constructors’ Championship with two races remaining. He concluded: “We are starting to consolidate more and more. There are still two races and a sprint left, we have to be careful, but I think these six points help a lot.”
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