Kubica and Russell ‘hid’ Williams’ parts problem
George Russell will miss Robert Kubica when he leaves Williams after 2019.
Robert Kubica says he and George Russell were able to “hide” Williams’ parts shortage this season by avoiding “silly things”.
Williams’ dismal 2019 had one positive, neither Kubica or Russell had retired from a race, that was until Romain Grosjean collided with Russell in Singapore to give the team their first DNF of the season and Russell his maiden retirement in Formula 1.
Russell would fail to finish again the following week after crashing out of the Russian GP with a wheel nut retainer issue, while shortly after Kubica was told to retire his FW42 to save parts.
Williams were concerned that their supplies could run out during the remaining ‘flyaway’ events in 2019, so Kubica believes the team have been “lucky” that he and Russell were able to avoid “silly” incidents for most of the season.
“I think we were very lucky, or somehow you have to be lucky as well, as in first-lap accident you never know as you have no control of the others,” Kubica is quoted by Motorsportweek.com.
“I think together with George we have been lucky the whole season not to do silly things, or limit silly things, and we were able to hide the problem for pretty long.
“But unfortunately Singapore and Russia showed up that we were not ready for what is called a risk of motorsport, and racing, as in the end nothing strange happened we just lost a couple of front wings, which might happen every weekend.”
Kubica, who will leave the team at the end of 2019, believes it’s important that Williams understand that in racing, damage happens, rather than chancing it with limited parts.
“Of course we were unfortunate with George losing two front wings in Singapore, and one in Russia, but still it’s kind of things that it’s racing, it can happen,” the Polish driver explained.
“I think we were pretty lucky it happened so late in the season as probably we [would have] faced the same problem of Russia earlier in the season if there was an accident.
“As a team we have to react to what happened and hopefully will not happen again.”
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