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As the Williams racing prepares
for the launch of their 2021 challenger the FW43B one person who is looking
forward to the season ahead is Williams driver Nicholas Latifi. After his
rookie season in 2020 the Canadian is hoping to see his track performances
improve, especially compared to his more highly rated team-mate George
Russell.
Coming off a season that saw his performances somewhat hidden by those of
George but despite this he still feels that his strong race performances
were let down by his poor performances in qualifying. Nicholas would find
himself out qualified by his teammate at Williams. But despite this Nicholas
would achieve three 11th place finishes in his rookie season despite
successfully making it into Q2 only once across the season.
In an interview for GPFans Global Nicholas spoke of his views in regard to
his performances compared to George.
Nicholas said: "I think naturally, that kind of understanding about what I
need to do in the races is a stronger area for me."
"Not to say that is a weakness of George's. George is obviously just
exceptionally strong on a Saturday where in general I feel I hadn't
extracted the most out of the car but more specifically, myself in a lot of
the qualifying, I hadn't finished and been like oh, where do I find this
time.
"Most of the time, I finished a lap and was like 'oh, I could have matched
that time and I made a mistake in that corner or my out lap wasn't perfect
and my brakes weren't in the window'."
So despite his lack of qualifying pace Nicholas still is of the view that he
was doing things right on race day.
"There have always been some things where we were trying to put things
together which is obviously very difficult in any category, specifically F1.
I think George was exceptionally good at doing that.
"What is he now, 'Mr Saturday' or something? But I think that highlights the
fact that I am relatively closer to the performance in races that the tyre
management, the old strength of mine in F2 is clearly there still.
"But I definitely need to improve Saturday's because having that starting
position would make such a big difference in the race."
As for what makes his team-mate so strong Nicholas in an interview with
GPFans.com added: "I think what gets noticed the most, not only from drivers
but from the general public, is the Saturday [performance]."
"Obviously, so much emphasis is on the qualifying because it is kind of
showing your potential, showing your speed.
"The fact that he is exceptionally good on Saturdays, putting laps together,
gets close to the maximum from the car consistently because he very rarely
has things go wrong, whether that is from a mistake in the lap or a mistake
in the preparation or what have you.
"It is just always being put together. I think that is what gets noticed the
most and obviously, being his teammate, seeing his data and the consistency
of that, it is one of his strong points.
"Probably, from my experience with other teammates, he is probably one of
the best on a Saturday that I have raced against. So that is obviously a
really big part of what being a racing driver is."
In the teams pre-season filimg day shakedown Nicholas and George would
complete their first drive of the 2021 Williams, the FW43B. The next event
for the team is the official launch on March 5, then it is off to a brief
three day test at Barain prior to the first race of the season where we will
see whether of not Nicholas can close the gap to his team-mate. |
