George Russell has full praise for his friend Alexander Albon for his solid performances so far in F1 2022 as Nicholas Latifi is not surprised with it.
After losing his Red Bull seat to Sergio Perez, Albon was sidelined for a year where he took up the reserve and simulator role alongside a DTM drive. But he has since made his return to F1 with Williams replacing his friend Russell, who moved to Mercedes.
It is a second chance for Albon in F1 and so far he has impressed everyone at Williams and across the grid. And Russell has full praise for him. “Alex has done an exceptional job,” he said. “I think there was obviously no secret he had a tough time that Red Bull, but I think all of us, even probably Max included, just knew how talented Alex was.
“And we’ve, as I said, we’ve all raced each other since 2011. Alex, was a few years older than us. So he was sort of competing against de Vries at the time, in KF one, I remember and he’s always been there. He’s always been one of the very best, so it’s no surprise to me, and I think happy to see that he’s back in F1, and that he has cemented his position,” summed up Russell.
Such has been the performances of Albon, that is no time he has managed to outshine his teammate Latifi who has equal praise. The Canadian is not surprised by his performances as the two already were teammates in F2 at DAMS and that he always expected him to do as well as Russell did at Williams.
“I think it goes without saying they’re both very, extremely quick drivers,” said Latifi. “And I mean, especially when Alex was announced as the race driver that was going to be my teammate, I had no illusions that he was he was not going to be on the pace straight away, despite him missing out a year.
“Obviously, I raced against him in 2018, or I raced as his teammate in 2018, and I know just how quick he was. So I think in many ways, the similarities, there are obviously some little differences in driving style here and there, which I kind of knew going into the season as well, just from, again, having been teammates with Alex beforehand. I won’t say the driving style secrets because maybe they don’t want to disclose that. But it’s been great having both them as teammates,” summed up Latifi.
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