He’s shown flashes of speed (was it Jeddah qualy where he had a great lap that got deleted?) and seems to have gotten his crashing under control during the second half of the season.
He’s not been close to Albon, but at this point i rate Albon really highly so that doesn’t mean too much. He was good in both karting and junior series, so there is potential there, and by all accounts the team seems to love working with him so it makes sense to keep him on for another year instead of resetting.
He will have to step up and show improvement next year, though.
Yeah, amazing stat and just shows you the challenge facing the current junior field. With the social media aspect mixed in, the investment in drivers is massive now and the costs to bringing new people in seem to make less and less sense
Overall this is a great signing for them. It continues to build faith in their academy program, which hopefully should prove itself in the future. If they had dropped Sargeant for a RB/Merc Junior it would have definitely played against them for prospective signings.
But did he really show any trend of improvement over the course of the season? I’m genuinenly asking, but it didn’t appear like it to me.
If there isn’t much of an indication he’s improving, why would anyone expect better results next year? It’s not like he’s going to have opportunity to improve his pace or consistency during the off-season.
I would say there was some improvement In the last third of season. He wasn’t crashing anymore and was consistent in the time difference (more or less) to albon as well.
On top of that, we just don’t see the data the team is seeing when it comes to an improvement.
One other thing to keep in mind. There is a supposedly very talented new driver starting in F2 next year that could drive for Williams in 2025, so that could play into the decision as well. Although I just looked for it and couldn’t find it. I think Alex Jaques talked abiut it in the last F2 sessions.
He is skipping f3 completely, similar to Verstappen who skipped f2 and Raikkonen who skipped both. Whether Antonelli will make f1 following this obviously depends on his junior career and what happens in the driver market.
I would argue that with the cost cap and the restrictions on testing, it is extremely challenging for young drivers to break through. I’m personally impressed with Sargeant and applaud his resigning for next year. I could easily see him getting dropped however if his results to Albon don’t continue to improve.
Tbf to Logan, Albon’s car was often far more updated than Logan. I’m not saying that Logan would have beaten Albon, but a lot of the gap was car related.
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