Williams team boss James Vowles is proud of their young driver programme
Williams team boss James Vowles praised his outfit's young driver programme after Franco Colapinto had taken over Logan Sargeant's car during the first practice at last weekend's British Grand Prix.
Every F1 team must give at least two practice sessions to a young rookie driver each season. Last Friday saw four F1 teams run young drivers, including Williams.
The Grove-based outfit provided his F2 driver Franco Colapinto with an FP1 outing in the opening practice session at the British Grand Prix. It was not only a milestone for his career, but he was the first driver from Argentina to take part in an F1 race weekend since Gaston Mazzacane in 2001.
Williams’s young driver programme now includes Franco Colapinto, Zak O'Sullivan, Luke Browning, Jamie Chadwick, Lia Block and Alessandro Giusti.
Colapinto and O’Sullivan race in Formula 2 while Browning competes in Formula 3. Chadwick switched to American racing in 2023 and races in Indy NXT this year.
Block joined Williams last year, and races in F1 Academy in 2024. Giusti represents Williams in the hotly-contested Formula Regional European Championship.
Reflecting Colapinto's outing at Silverstone, team boss James Vowles said: "I think, first of all, today was sort of a reward for a very strong Formula 2 season. I like recognising that we have a strong young driver programme. We invested in Logan and we'll continue to invest in our young driver programme, simple as that.
"It's expanding quite significantly in the background. And today wasn't a showcase or demonstration or a test. It was simply reward for a good progression. And we have to do two FP1s in the season. It's sensible to do it here at Silverstone.
"I didn't expect it to be wet then dry then wet but anyway, that's Silverstone as well for you. I believe that you really can burn a driver if you put them in the car too soon. And actually in modern day Formula 1, what you're seeing is rookies are struggling as a result of things.
"So it's not just about excellent, you've done a fairly good Formula 2, you got a podium. Actually our investment, our commitment to them has to be an amount of time in a historic car, an amount of time with preparation to make sure that if we choose them to go forward, they're effectively in the strongest place they can be. And we haven't provided that to Franco at this point," Vowles noted.
