Williams Chief Reveals Franco Colapinto's Ambitious F1 Targets Despite No 2025 Contract

Colapinto aims to reach teammate Albon's level by end of 2024 season despite lack of 2025 contract.

Franco Colapinto - Williams Racing / Williams Racing Press Image

Williams team principal James Vowles has disclosed that Franco Colapinto is setting ambitious targets for his future in Formula 1, even though he doesn't have a contract for 2025. The Argentine driver aims to be on par with teammate Alex Albon by the end of the 2024 season.

The opportunity for Colapinto followed Williams' decision to drop American driver Logan Sargeant before the Italian Grand Prix, allowing Colapinto to participate in the final nine F1 Grands Prix of the 2024 season. The Argentine driver made an impressive F1 weekend debut at Monza, advancing six places to finish 12th. This performance caught Vowles' eye, as Colapinto finished only 14 seconds behind Albon, despite starting nine places behind his teammate in qualifying.

Vowles disclosed to the media, as quoted by Motorsport Week:

“He has nothing to prove to the world. Other drivers have something to prove to the world.

“What that means is you’re not going to see a driver going out there trying to demonstrate to everyone, I have a deserving place in this world.

“And so therefore he knows that he has time to build into it. We start here in Monza because he has the least experience in Monza in this circumstance and that’s important to him.

“Next, what we’re expecting of him, his own words, this is not mine, is that he knows how to progress race and race.

“He’s done the same in Formula 2 this year. If you look at where he started and where he is now, it’s a very different picture between the two.

“And the way you do that is you build up in a method that’s systematic and he has that available to him.

“His own words are, by the end of the year, he should be matching Alex and on the journey there he should be closing the gap every race weekend. I think those are realistic targets.

“They’re not ones I set him. What I’ve said to him is actually more enjoy the moment and enjoy the element of things. Don’t think about the million details that come towards you.

“Focus on the ones that generate milliseconds of performance and use this as an experience gain. His own targets are that, and I think that’s somewhat reasonable.”

Despite his progress and ambition, Colapinto won't be contending for a permanent Williams seat in 2025, as the team has already signed Carlos Sainz from Ferrari for that season. However, Colapinto remains a significant prospect for Williams or other F1 teams. Vowles continued:

“So even before he was here coming into this F1 seat, we were looking at his future.

“As a part of our academy, our responsibility is to work with him, with his teams around him as well, to where your future lies. And there’s opportunities in other racing series.

“As I said, depending on how he performs, the future to a certain extent is in his hands.

“What I mean by that is if he performs exceptionally well, clearly he’ll remain here as a reserve driver and we’ll invest in him in terms of TPC testing and other elements that we’re able to do with him at the same time. You may see interest from other teams as well, depending on how he performs. So he has a future in that regard.

“And Formula 1 is fickle. Look at what’s changed in six months, let alone one year.

“So no one here around this table knows what opportunities exist in any of the teams in 2025 or 2026, the truth.

“So you’re investing in someone that I think will have opportunity and there are still seats available on the grid as well.”