Williams have “huge amounts of performance to come”

In brief

Williams expect gains from car

After Alexander Albon scored Williams’ first points with ninth place in Monaco, Vowles admitted “points could [have been] achieved beforehand, but there’s just some elements of the car, including the overweight [chassis], where we haven’t quite delivered as we need to.”

However he added “you need a result like this to make sure everyone’s heads are lifted, believe in the journey we’re on and there’s plenty of reasons to be optimistic.”

“We have huge amounts of performance to come,” he said in a video released by the team. “It’s a long season, we are only just at the beginning of it. What we need to do now is build on what we have, make sure we understand at the factory what we did wrong in this circumstance.

“We didn’t get everything right this weekend, nor did we across the first few races. But we understand what we can improve going forward. We’ve got Canada where there’s more performance coming again. Across the next six rounds there’s plenty to look forward to. So we’ll keep that positive momentum going, make sure we’re delivering performance at the track.”

Blomqvist to sit out next two races

Tom Blomqvist will not take part in the next two IndyCar races, his Meyer Shank team have announced. Helio Castroneves will substitute for him at this weekend’s race in Detroit and the following round in Road America.

“It is fair to say that the last couple of days have been some of the hardest in my career,” said Blomqvist, who crashed out on the first lap of the Indianapolis 500 last week. “Everyone who knows me knows how much I love being a part of the MSR family and together we have enjoyed some amazing successes and victories.”

Team co-owner Michael Shank said “making this decision was by far the hardest one we have had to make. Tom is 100% still a part of the MSR family and will remain a part of the team for the rest of the season.

“The decision was not made lightly and after much discussion with Tom, and with back-to-back races coming up, we have decided to have Helio drive in Detroit and at Road America.”

Rivals’ moves “stupid” in Indy 500 – O’Ward

Pato O’Ward was relieved to come through the Indianapolis 500 unscathed despite narrowly losing victory to Josef Newgarden on the final lap.

“Every 500 for me has been very different,” said O’Ward, who finished second in the race as he did in 2022, having crashed out last year. “There’s been some that I’ve led a lot more and been up front a lot more.

“This one we were stuck a lot more. Some people were driving like maniacs on the restarts. I was just playing defence for 85 percent of the race. Some of the moves out there were just mental, stupid. I was just glad that I didn’t touch anybody, I didn’t crash.”

O’Ward said Newgarden was “a great competitor” after narrowly losing victory to him. “I’ve raced wheel to wheel with him so many times. He’s obviously one of the stars in the series, one of the strong ones. I knew it was going to be a fight until the end. Just two corners short.

“I really thought that I did everything in my power to get it done.”

Andretti still “confident” of F1 team chance

Mario Andretti says he remains “optimistic” about his team’s chances of getting a team into Formula 1 because “we’re doing everything that is asked of us.”

“On the other side, on the commercial side, it’s been a bit foggy,” he told the New York Times. “We’ve been told the decision was not final, but then tell us what will make the decision for us to enter.

“But to show good faith, the team and Michael have been investing millions and millions of dollars, which is what it takes to form the team. And once we get a green light, we won’t start from scratch. The objective is to be on the grid in 2026.”

Record US audience for Monaco Grand Prix

Sunday’s Monaco Grand Prix attracted the largest live US television audience for the event. A peak of 2.3 million people watched the race on ABC, and an average of 1.9m.

Date set for Porsche Formula E appeal

Porsche’s appeal against Antonio Felix da Costa’s disqualification following his victory in the first Misano EPrix will be heard on June 9th. The stewards found the throttle damper spring on his car did not confirm with a technical bulletin issued for the race.

Da Costa’s disqualification handed victory to Oliver Rowland, who lies fourth in the championship, 36 points shy of Nick Cassidy, who did not score in the race.

Links

Motor racing links of interest:

F1 officials promise to make F1 Las Vegas Grand Prix ‘smarter, more efficient’ (Autoweek)

Liberty Media CEO Greg Maffei: ‘In some cases we moved so quickly, I credit Las Vegas for the help they gave us, to get that race literally from zero, in 15 months, is just amazing. I think we’ll be smarter, we’ll be more efficient, we’ll probably be less disruptive to the community, we’ll probably understand better and better what fans want.’

My first Monaco GP: An enchanting F1 weekend that needs evolution (The New York Times)

‘Monaco (and F1, by extension) is the epitome of exclusivity. It costs thousands of dollars just to enter a yacht into the harbour, a price that doesn’t even include mooring the vessel (try $22,000 for Thursday to Monday, at a minimum).’

Billy Monger drives our Gen3 in Shanghai (Formula E via YouTube)

Phase 1 of the redevelopment at the Hungaroring completed (Hungaroring)

‘According to the original timeline, phase 1 was to finish the retaining walls of the event area, but the contractor decided to widen the paddock and also to complete construction of the two tunnels under the finish straight. This pre-performance will facilitate and speed up the continuation of the works after the 2024 Formula 1 race. ‘

Lotterer: ‘Hopefully more Le Mans wins will come!’ (FIA WEC)

‘I think if I look back what my parents have done for me, all the sacrifices that my family did for me to succeed is something that we can all be proud of together and it was all worth it.’

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Sadly it now looks like even the @FIA have given up on trying to increase the size of the @F1 field with President Ben Sulayem now suggesting Andretti go buy one of the existing teams …

— Tiff Needell 🏁 (@tiff_tv) May 29, 2024

F1 announced their 2025 calendar in April. It’s June, and MotoGP still can’t decide on their 2024 calendar…

— Simon Patterson (@denkmit) May 29, 2024

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