Carlos Sainz: Williams’ 2026 reality has been ‘an eye-opener’

Carlos Sainz admitted Williams’ drop in performance in 2026 was not among his expectations, with the gap to the top being a “bit of an eye-opener”.

Sainz opted to join Williams after negotiations up and down the grid in 2024, while in his last season at Ferrari, and took two podium finishes in his first year with the Grove-based team.

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In taking fifth in the Constructors’ standings last season, Sainz believes the team “overdelivered” in how expected his first year to go, with the FW47 having proven a quick car on its day with the ability to fight at the upper end of the midfield or higher.

With the 2026 regulation change having long been in the team’s sights, a difficult start to the year was compounded by the FW48 proving to be overweight compared to its rivals, and despite upgrades having been brought through the season, Williams has not scored a point in the past five races – with both Sainz and Alex Albon finishing two laps down in Hungary.

Having acknowledged how well Williams performed last season, the 31-year-old added that 2026 has been “character-building” over at Grove, given just how far there now is to go to eventually race among the frontrunners.

“No, it wasn’t in my plans, or it wasn’t in my expectations,” Sainz said when asked if he had expected to have six points at the halfway point of the season.

“I think I’ve been very open and very clear on the fact that I think in 2025 we overdelivered and, if anything, the results were better than what I expected when I signed my Williams contract in ’24.

“The 2025 car was a very, very good car. A car that was only sometimes three to four tenths off pole position, a car that you could feel the balance was a good balance. So, obviously, going into ’26, I expected, if anything, with more time to develop with the ’26 car and a new set of regulations, that we could potentially either stay where we were or do a small step forward.

“But, time has proven to me that it’s been obviously the opposite or the other way round, and that as a team we are more far away from the top than what we thought we were at the end of ’25, so it’s been definitely a character-building year for the whole team.

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“Bit of an eye-opener in terms of how much work there is to do still, if we even want to consider fighting with a top team in the future.

“A lot of things learned, a lot of things that we’ve realised, and unfortunately, a bad year so far. So, we need to conclude, understand why, what happened. I think we have a pretty good understanding by now.

“Is there capacity to turn it around? Obviously in Formula 1, it takes time, effort, it takes budget cap money, and it takes a lot of analysis – and that’s exactly where we are right now.”

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