Aitken confident he’ll ‘end up in the right place’

While Jack Aitken does not have a seat for 2021, he remains confident he will “end up in the right place” eventually.

Aitken made his Formula 1 debut at the 2020 Sakhir Grand Prix, standing in for George Russell at Williams who replaced Lewis Hamilton at Mercedes for the race.

He was generally impressive, pushing Nicholas Latifi close in qualifying and making few mistakes in the race.

Given this, while he’s not thinking too much about his future, he’s not worried about his lack of a seat for 2021 and has faith that things will work out for him.

“It definitely shows that I can do the job,” he told Crash.net shortly after making his debut.

“Part of the reason I was so keen to go again was that after one weekend I felt I could put together a much better weekend even. But my focus has just been to get on with the job and do it as well as I can.

“If that benefits me down the line then all the better, but there’s not much point dwelling on the future right now. It’s just getting on and doing as well as I can in the car.

“2022 is a long way down the road. I’m just focusing on my performances on the track. There’s nothing that I can particularly say or do other than performing on the track that’s going to benefit me in 22.

“I just want to impress right here and right now and if I continue to do that I’m confident that I’ll end up in the right place.”

Get your hands on the official Williams 2020 collection via the Formula 1 store 

Asides from the race weekend in Bahrain, 2020 proved to be a difficult year for Aitken as he struggled in Formula 2, finishing the season down in P14 with two podiums and no wins to his name.

While he admits that he has self-doubts, he says that those performances have nothing to do with it, and is just focusing on staying consistent and prepared for whatever comes his way.

“I think everybody has some form of doubt sometimes,” he added.

“All I mean to say by that is we are all human, and I think even if I’d had a really good run in F2 this year, or things had turned out differently, you would still have doubts no matter what.

“What I have done is just try to focus on having the same approach as this weekend, and previous weekends, and just do the best job you can in the car and the opportunities will present themselves.

“The last few years have all been about trying to maximise my results on track every time I get out there and then putting myself in positions where those opportunities can present themselves.”

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